After watching Star Wars The Last Jedi yesterday, I feel a sudden urge to add a new year’s resolution: write my own script for that movie. Same end position, but the events leading up to it may be totally different. Oh, and I might kill off some other characters too.
Then I’ll turn it into an adventure game (text or P&C)
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… and I’ll have to rewrite the last 20 minutes of The Force Awakens too.
They should kill everyone but Kylo Ren. He is by far the most interesting character since the original Luke (in the first half of the movie).
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Well… that would make episode IX a 3 hour long monologue accumulating into a suicide. As artistically interesting that may be, with SW being the merchandising machine it is… not gonna happen.
And eventually, it seems they’ll kill all of the characters off (if the actors don’t die in real life first 
). So far the new trilogy feels like Game of thrones PG-12
I enjoyed TLJ more than any other SW movie from the last 20 years. So I’m very satisfied. It’s always difficult to create something new in such a fantastic world, because everyone has a very individual opinion about why the original movies have been so amazing. And even if everyone loved the same aspects of the original trilogy, it would still have been a challenge to create new movies without just stealing the good ideas from the old films.
I found the prequels very disappointing, when they came into the cinemas. In episode VII, they successfully avoided the mistakes from the prequels, but the were still some weaknesses. For example:
- ideas stolen from the original trilogy, such as the desert planet at the beginning and the Starkiller Base, which is actually a 3rd Death Star
- the way Han Solo gets killed
- dozens of unanswered questions (Why is Ray so familiar with the force?)
Ep. VIII isn’t perfect either. I would have written a different script for Ep. VIII, too, but I had way more fun in the theatre than I had had with VII or with the prequels. And, this is not just due to the high number of jokes in TLJ (some of them are misplaced). It was just a very entertaining movie - at least during this first time I watched it. For this reason, I have been very surprised about this flood of negative reviews on TLJ. Interestingly, on Rotten Tomatoes, the Tomatometer (90 %) and the audience score (50 %) differ extremely from each other. I suppose that it’s a matter of expectation. It’s clear that Disney cannot read our minds. And, even if they could, they would still be unable to satisfy all expectations. Future generations of people, who will grow up with this new trilogy without having waited so long for it (and without having read the flood of negative reviews in advance) might be going to watch these new films mostly without bias, so the audience score might increase in the long term.
After the underwhelming Rogue One I might have liked The Last Jedi more than it deserves. Mostly because it felt so good to see a Star Wars movie that was actually fun again. I loved Domhnall Gleesons scenery chewing and generally everything about Mark Hammil´s performance (shoulder brush!). And I still like Rey so much more than the bland Jynn. The best thing about Rogue One was that Robot who died far too early.
However I still agree with pretty much every criticism about Rogue One. Still enjoyed it immensly in the theater and probably would again re-watching it.
That´s always your solution to everything!
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I always knew MI would have been better had Captain Smirk when Guybrush showed him his sword just taken it and casually thrown away.
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I think that is because it felt like a fairytale of pretty much good vs evil (no “gray”, tormented characters, all the bad guys wearing masks to literally hide emotions and preventing the audience to sympathise with these faceles beings), the fantastic visual design by Ralph Quarry, the subdued humor (R2-D2, C3-PO, Han Solo’s wittiness,…) and the groundbreaking visual effects. And the music score by John Williams! The Empire Strikes Back added the imperial march, the Hoth battle, drama with " I AM your father" and Han getting frozen and did what the second act of any classic trilogy should do: develop characters. The same way, ROTJ fulfilled its role of third act, closing all storylines (although by that time, the first criticism on recycling ideas came: a second Death Star? Really?) but still, there is so much to like in those. (Though I’m sure there’s people hating those childish Ewoks, but they got Leia in the bikini, so everyone’s happy)
The new trilogy and Rogue One at least feel more like the original trilogy in terms of visuals, unlike the over-done CGI of the prequels. (Although, I was surprised to learn how many real setpieces were actually built and used for those as it all felt so artificial and mostly green screen footage to me). I don’t know if Yoda in TLJ is a puppet or CGI, but at least he felt like a puppet (without looking like one), so I was happy.
The main issue I have with the new trilogy, as a whole, is that it doesn’t feel like a trilogy. The prequels, although loved-to-hate by most “real” SW fans, had at least a clear story arc: from Anakin to Vader, again in three “classic” acts. In contrast, TFA (ep. 7) did a perfect job at being a classic first act, introducing characters and giving them a “quest”. It is setting up some story arcs that are dismissed in the most unimaginative ways in TLJ. Why does ep. 8 feel like a third act? And one without a “happy end” - which unlike ep. 3 is an issue, since you do not know what it leads to. (For now). Perhaps when ep. 9 is done, I’ll change my mind and appreciate the story and the character’s motivation better in ep. 8, but for now I feel just saddened and can’t shake off the impression that episode 8 only tries to “undo” episode 7 and -worse- the original trilogy by extension. After the end of ep.6, you could think “and they lived happily ever after”, but that is deconstructed here to the very last vein. Hell, they even managed to turn R2 into an a-hole!
On the bright side, I liked how episode 7 was a long salute to Han, and he got to play a large and important role -without falling out of character (unlike the uninspired cameo of princess Lea). If they’re going to salute each the original trilogy characters before/whilst passing the torch: that is how you do it.
Wow, sorry for the rant.
I’ll post some shorter list of likes and dislikes later.
Warning: this is full of spoilers. I’ll blur out the biggest ones for those who didn’t watch The Last Jedi yet.
Dislikes:
- no kiss between Han and Leia in Ep7 ?? Why? As if old people kissing = Ewww ??
On the other hand, Luke kissing Leia (on the forehead) in Ep.8 while he is projecting? doesn’t seem to be an issue with the writers. How is that even possible - characters get introduced when the script calls for them and then they die as cannon fodder either 5 minutes later or at least in the same movie. (Admiral Holdo, Rose, Rose’s sister,…)
- characters of episode 7 get killed off without having done anything that matters or developing their (back)stories (Snokes, Phasma). That feels as if the director/writer wanted to just rectify “mistakes” in the episode 7 story.
- In a universe where blasters and melee-weapons both exist, switching from blasters to stick-fighting for no reason (or because “you need to suffer”) just feels like the bad guy in a James Bond movie explaining his plans and then leaving so the good guy can escape. Like Guybrush in MI2. At least, that one was well-executed (pun not intented). In TLJ, it just felt like sloppy story editing: “Wait,we sitll have to show these other characters racing against the clock, to the rescue, so what can we do to stall time a bit?” In short: plot armour. Not to mention the inexplicable martial arts skills of EVERY. SINGLE. CHARACTER. The wonderful scene of Indiana Jones dealing with the swordslinger on the market place in Raiders of the lost Ark comes to mind…
- Who is Finn? A janitor (ep.8)? or a stormtrooper who has to raid villages (ep.7) Either way, why would Cpt. Phasma remember his number/face? Especially if he was only just sweeping floors, as he said in ep.8.
- Why does Luke set up a treasure hunting map if he doesn’t want to be found?
- Since when does even a fictional universe have to be “politically correct” in terms of equal men/women white/black/asian/alien/robot representation- while in real life it isn’t (I bet they got paid less than their male white counterparts)? In the original trilogy, we had Mon Mothma as well, it just wasn’t a big fuss. She sat next to a fish guy. Now, you get scenes with Poe Damaron entering the HQ room which is filled with only women (technicians,…). I even think one of the Supreme Leader red guards was a woman. And I liked the girl bomber pilot. They killed her 5 minutes later And I though the X-wing girl pilot was cool too They blew her up with the whole hangar, only saving Poe Dameron and BB-8
- Talking about those red guards: why do they fight AFTER Snokes is killed?
- Why not kill Leia? You know Carrie Fisher died in real life, rest her soul ? At least two opportunities in TLJ were missed to do that in an acceptable way: either when she was blown in to space, either replacing Holdo in the sacrifice.
- no technical advances in 30 years (still X-wings, TIE fighters,…) In real life, this just corresponds to the uninspired visual recycling. At least that part was done right in the prequels.
- I just want to grab Kylo Ren and give him a good spanking, with that sulky teenage wining “Oh, look at me, I am so torn!”. It’s just that his character motivation is not elaborated in a believable way at all.
- too many jokes, especially the ones were they make fun of themselves (that ironing uniforms shot!).
Likes:
- high suspense scenes (unfortunately ending almost all in an anti-climax)
- visual effects and the way they feel like the orginal trilogy and not CGI-fest
- the acting is actually pretty good, for a SW movie.
- it feels like Star Wars thanks to the unispired visual recycling.
- some of the jokes (I though the General “Hugs” was funny), but not all.
- the fourth wall breaking wisdom (paraphrased) : “this will never end as long as we continue to root for either side”. In short Disney said: stop loving Star Wars or we won’t stop butchering it.
Oh, wait, that just makes me sad, knowing I’ll keep buying tickets to see the next and the next and…
I agree with you that some story twists in TLJ are surprisingly radical. Nonetheless, I’m okay with almost all of them. For example, Snoke had been boring to me anyway.
The “clear story arc” you described is indeed a characteristical attribute of the prequels. Though, I think that it made the prequels more boring, because some progresses in the story were predictable and there were only few story twists.
By the way, I read that Lawrence Kasdan had reworked/improved the script for TESB essentially, until shortly before they started to film it. Hence, the original trilogy, including the awesome TESB, evolved similarly to the new trilogy - albeit the basic cornerstones for the entire original trilogy had already been laid a few years before A New Hope was made.
I read that they created a new puppet by using the same mold that had been used for the original Yoda puppet in the 70s. I was happy about that scene, too.
On the one hand, there needs to be a justification for the sequels. On the other hand, I agree that it was very drastic. No one of the main characters ended where I had expected her/him after ROTJ. I had hoped to see a reunion of the complete Falcon’s crew (Han, Leia, Chewie, Luke, R2-D2, C-3PO) with some nostalgic dialog lines. But, Han and Luke never met each other in the new trilogy. I think this was unnecessarily sad! Also, it would have been great to see Lando again.
While I was too I heard a criticism that made sense to me.
Why is he acting all goofy? He was acting like that at the beginning in Empire because he was disguising himself to Luke. But when the truth was out he got into serious Master Yoda mode and never changed back. Why is he acting like fake Yoda as a force ghost talking to old Luke?
I don’t remember the details in that scene, but I interpreted it as if Yoda was happy about Luke’s return, as he had not only lived in exile from the resistance, but also in exile from the Force. Therefore, they hadn’t seen each other for a long time. Also, Yoda seems to have a more relaxed attitude towards everything - maybe because he has become even more wise. In my opinion, Yoda’s mood is very suitable for what he tells Luke: That our own mistakes are lessons for the future (or similar). Yoda seemed very unconstrained and authentic to me during that talk - which might be a great performance, seeing that he is just a puppet.
Especially: He is not Luke’s teacher any more, but he has become Luke’s (best?) friend.
Especially since in the meantime Kenny Baker and Carrie Fisher died. And Peter Mayew is credited only as Chewie consultant in TLJ. Even if they did not want to have present scenes with the complete crew, they could have well thrown in some flashbacks to flesh out the story of what happened in betweeb, while they has the opportunity.
Yes, but that is because he was only like the emperor in TESB: a halogram. The anticlimax in TLJ felt as if they realised this parallel after TFA release and found no better way to handle it. If a character is boring, either cut him/her before you release the movie or try to make him/her more interesting in the sequel.
Yes, they could have portrayed Snoke in Ep. 8 before he died. But, I think he would still have seemed very misplaced in this trilogy. But, I personally would rather blame the script of Ep. 7 for this issue, since he first appeared there. It would have been okay (and more realistic), if the leader of the First Order hadn’t been strong with the force and Kylo Ren had seized power when the opportunity arised, so that the First Order had suddenly become even more menacing by that.
That is pretty good! I didn’t think of that and perhaps not even the writers did…
Kasdan co-wrote/reworked the script of TFA, but neither he or JJ Abrams seem to have been involved in the writing of TLJ. That might explain some things too? I see that for episode 9, Abrams is back in the writer/director’s chair and he has a track record of pulling plot twists out of his hat (Lost, Alias to name a few), so who knows…
Still it doesn’t take away my impression that Rian Johnson was given too much freedom in his screenplay writing for TLJ or the lacking of overal story arcs that matter for all major characters (including Snokes). It’s as if someone of the executives said : ok just make it look like a Star Wars movie and shoot it already! The strict two-year release plan, interleaved with the spin-offs, isn’t helping either, I guess.
By the way, do you remember see those teaser photographs of the cast doing a reading of TFA? http://www.slashfilm.com/lego-star-wars-episode-7-script-read/
You’ve got the new actors like Ridley and Boyega in there next to the old squad with Ford, Fisher,… and Hamill.
Yes: Mark Hamill, who says exactly how many words in TFA? Or has how many seconds of screen time in that movie now again? In hindsight, why was he there at the reading? And that’s why people get upset with the end of TFA and the whole portrayal of Luke in TLJ.
You can find lots of clips with Mark explaining his own anticipation “ah, so when the lightsaber in the snow flies across Kylo Ren: that’s where I enter!” being thwarted. And his own frustration that it should have been Luke and Leia witnessing Han’s demise instead of these “two strangers (Rey and Finn) he just met 20 minutes ago”. So TFA leaves you waiting for two years on finally getting to really see Luke back and then… they destroy this iconic character by bad writing and editing in TLJ.
Missed opportunity.
You are right. Snoke is a good example for that. If they had kept the entire trilogy in mind from the get-go, Snoke would either have been cut out or have ended up as a more interesting/complex character.
Moreover, I still don’t understand Kylo Ren’s motivations. I do understand that the dark side makes you aggressive and eager for power, but I just wonder what happens in his mind when he kills his unarmed father. Not even Darth Vader would have done that, seeing that he tried to convert Luke to the dark side. Vader even tried to convert Obi Wan in Ep. III, but, as we know, Obi Wan resisted and thwarted him eventually. So, in both previous trilogies, the Sith acted more logical than Kylo Ren does. Maybe it’s supposed to be an evolutionary process: If the Jedi are supposed to end, maybe the Sith are as well. And maybe Kylo will never be a Sith, but something new. Though, even then they would still have to explain why he assassinated his unarmed father. All we know is that he is driven by inner aggressions. Therefore it was not just a strategic precaution.
I’m okay with Luke in TLJ. If he had fought personally against Kylo Ren, he would have been killed, just as Obi Wan had been killed in the very first movie. Unlike Han Solo, Luke dies like a hero, so it’s okay to me.
Maybe some dialog lines are a matter of opinion, but I understand his points of view. He is depressive and ashamed, since he failed Kylo Ren - and his exile might not have made it easier for him. Due to his absence from the force, he might not even have talked to Obi Wan, who had made a similar experience when he failed Anakin. Eventually, Rey and Yoda help Luke to come to terms with the past. Even the fact that he drops the lightsaber is understandable, seeing his situation. He behaves very human, unlike Kylo.
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I fully agree on Kylo Ren’s confusing motivations!
During the movie, I also wondered, if the force is always in balance then Snokes+Ren=Luke+Rey.
But Snokes >> Ren and even Rey > Ren (as she beat and resisted him in TFA). So Luke must surely be able to take on Ren (and even Snokes). Or perhaps because in TFA, Luke was not connected to the force and thus Rey had to get a temporary boost? So when Luke connects to the force again, it actually weakens her? Which may explain why he did what he did in the end of TLJ?
Personally I just think they didn’t really think this through properly. With Anakin/Vader it was clear why and how he brought balance to the force again.
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I had a similar idea when Luke (or was it Rey?) mentioned that everywhere was a balance between light & shadow / good & evil (which is consistent with the yin & yang theory). I think that may be the reason why Luke wants the Jedi to end, as this would weaken the dark side at the same time.