Grinchy
Banned
"Now you know how women have felt for decades! Now do you understand why proper representation is so important??"
That's the kind of response I'd expect from a Resetera user.
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Star Wars The Last Jedi Spoiler discussion thread: THERE WILL BE UNMARKED SPOILERS!
- Thread starter Kimawolf
- Start date
That's the kind of response I'd expect from a Resetera user.
Amen! I wonder how much having a female protagonist influenced her mary sueness? Just having a female character doesn't bother me, but I kind of get the feeling they were all "Not only should we have a female protagonist, but we need to make sure she fits the baddass woman in every way girl power! Fantasy". And as if they were scared that making her look weak and vulnerable (regardless of the context) would get them backlash.
pramod
Banned
One of my major problems with Rey is that her motivations still dont make much sense to me.
I mean the whole deal with Finn wanting to just run away actually makes a lot lf sense. Why does he need to risk death and fight the First Order? And Poe is already a soldier and Han/Leia of course needs no explanation....but Rey. Whats her motivation? What is driving her to do all these things? I dont think the movies have given us a good answer yet.
I mean the whole deal with Finn wanting to just run away actually makes a lot lf sense. Why does he need to risk death and fight the First Order? And Poe is already a soldier and Han/Leia of course needs no explanation....but Rey. Whats her motivation? What is driving her to do all these things? I dont think the movies have given us a good answer yet.
MoFuzz
Member
Been trying to engage with that lot again, after taking a little break.
Good Lord. It really does feel like you're stepping into a minefield at times. There are some level headed individuals, but it just seems so skewed towards the passionate lovers of the movie who seem to want to deny that any faults exist.
MoFuzz
Member
It is especially sad to see Hollywood is pandering so obviously in this day and age when we already had strong female characters in fiction. Many of which are in Sci-Fi. Ellen Ripley in Alien, Sarah Connor in Terminator, oh and what's her name again? Princess Leia, from that one Star Wars movie 40 odd years ago. She was pretty cool too.
I think the diner trumps CB. Perhaps more that it was first to do so than anything though. Like after the diner, it's like ok anything goes.
But to be fair I also hated a akin and pad me arriving on theed under the guise of hiding. Anakon disembarks the cruiser carrying standard earth-like carryon luggage. I mean sure you can ask what do you think they put clothes in, but hey you could have hovering space luggage or something.
But honestly, perhaps the biggest "out-of-place" scene for me is the redone Jedi Rocks sequence in ROTJ.
Is it pandering? My 5-year old daughter loves Rey.
I think it's ok to let girls have their power fantasy.
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MoFuzz
Member
If she sees value in Rey, that is totally fine. She is obviously young and still impressionable, and has much to experience in life. I'm sure she will be exposed to a number of things as she gets older like all of us, and will make her own choices as she goes. Speaking personally, I would want my children to aspire to be more like the three figures that I mentioned, who actually work and struggle, as opposed to someone like Rey who is merely gifted things. That represents privilege and entitlement, which I can not relate to and would never want as traits for my hypothetical children if I had any say about it.
As I tried to convey, I don't have a problem with strong female characters, but they don't need to be shown as they were in this movie, as being virtually flawless, and at the expense of knocking men down a peg constantly. That just breeds hostility between groups.
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Typhares
Member
Luke has a moment should have been in there dammit! Show a bit of emotions for Han's death.
MoFuzz
Member
Nah, titty milk Luke was more important. Also, so was Rose Tico (a brand new character) mourning her sister's death (also a brand new character). That is far more vital than seeing original trilogy characters with 40 years of established cinema history mourn and feel emotion.
Rian knows best. My expectations were thoroughly subverted, and I am very thankful.
No doubt she will.
She's only 5 so she will naturally latch onto any character on screen that most represents her, and at that age that happens to be any female, be it Rose, Rey, Or Leia! She'll probably like Jyn too but Sheba hasn't seen Rogue One.
She likes that Rey has a light sabre for what that's worth.
OH-MyCar
Member
Ahsoka Tano had an admittedly rough start, but turned out to be an amazing female character. Any little girl who dresses up as Ahsoka for Halloween as a "power fantasy" is awesome because she was a female protagonist with a great arc. Asajj Ventress? Same thing. Mother Talzin? All great characters, all totally in line with the power fantasy thing. It's not just an issue with sex. It's just bad writing on Disney's behalf. If Rey were a boy, she'd be in line with the pathos & depth experienced by any male character from Goof Troop.
Even from the Disney era, Hera is a much better character than Rey. I'd rather see her everywhere.
Edit: I just realized my post comes across as "your daughter is stupid for dressing up like Rey!" and that's not my intention at all (I dressed up as Garfield as a kid and I have no excuses). I'm just addressing that general argument where people make some sort of stupid case that "the boys are upset that it's not their power fantasy" when criticizing Rey. There are so many other great female characters out there in the Star Wars universe.
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Leia shoots SO MANY people in Star Wars. Not sure how I never noticed until my pre-TFA rewatch, but she's seriously hardcore in the original and takes out just about everyone she aims at and racks up a Commando-style body count over the course of it, lol, while giving the boys all sorts of sass too and barely flinching at her home planet being blown up and getting interrogated and tortured by Vader. All without any special powers backing her up. Rey's fine but OG Princess Leia is an all-time badass action heroine.
And Jabba of all characters too.
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MoFuzz
Member
5 year old me gleefully agrees. Who wouldn't want a dope ass energy sword to slice and dice with?
Bullies at kindergarten? Not a problem.
pramod
Banned
Yeah I still think her killing Jabba was the most unexpectedly brutal (and badass) moment in all of Star Wars. I mean she just outright...murdered Jabba. I think the only other hero that did something that coldblooded was...Han? Come to think of it, it makes a lot of sense now that those two ended up together.
Lol.Yeah I still think her killing Jabba was the most unexpectedly brutal (and badass) moment in all of Star Wars. I mean she just outright...murdered Jabba. I think the only other hero that did something that coldblooded was...Han? Come to think of it, it makes a lot of sense now that those two ended up together.
And she did her hands and his chain. No lame blaster. She got her hands dirty!
Not to mention Admiral Gender Studies. They made her an awful character in every way. Even ignoring her lack of communication skills, she just sat around watching her ships get blown up one by one until the last minute, she finally did the stupid "hyper space ram" garbage.
Kadayi
Banned
Indeed. There are real issues with setting a character up whose supposed to be an inspiration if said character has no struggle and growth. Life just isn't smooth sailing, and it's important for children to understand that.
Depends on the age a little. As a kid, I latched onto Luke, He-man, and the like, and it's not like they are that deep a characters. Given, Luke was added to, but in New Hope, he was bit of a husk of a character that was supposed to be a farm boy-to-hero story, much like Rey in Force Awakens. I will admit the direction they took her in Last Jedi is not quite the one Luke goes on in Empire.
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So I bought Last Jedi, and have been delving into some of the extras.
The deleted scenes are really cool, and I wish some of them had made it in.
Also, the little mini documentary on the balance of the Force was interesting and helped solidify the ideas of why they chose what they did. I've listened to an interview elsewhere with Rian Johnson swell, but along with his discussions in the extras for Last Jedi, you can see that he is very much a fan of the Star Wars films and of the mythology, and he does seem to get it.
Sort of on point, he mentions that in Empire, Luke learning that Vader is his father is the hardest thing for him at that time, and likewise Rey learning that her parents are nobodies is the equivalent of that. She always wanted to learn what her place was in the galaxy, that there was a reason she was abandoned.... but to hear they are nobodies is her toughest thing. Part of her personal struggle. She needs to find her place on her own, or forge her own path. In that way at least, she does have a struggle and personal growth.
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Nicktendo86
Member
Of all the silly and stupid things in this film one of the biggest is the last Resistance ship flying in space until it runs out of fuel with no First Order ship able to catch up to it. The more I think about the whole concept the more it hurts my head as to how ridiculous it is.
Grinchy
Banned
Yeah, I'm dying for a Plinkett review of this movie. And not in the new style, but the way they used to do them - by dismantling every tiny horribly-written aspect of the "story."
MoFuzz
Member
Yep, me too, but at the same time, I'm not holding my breath. It took 10 months for the TFA Plinkett review.
I feel like they are so inundated with making so multiple videos and content now. Plus they seem to go out of their way to try and do something different from everyone else and say things that haven't been said.
Welp, it's official. I've been banned for apparently being a "misogynist" and "hostile" after pointing out their own bullshit to them. Fuck the left leaning extremeists in that place, seriously.
What a cesspool.
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Knob Creek
Banned
Man now that I think about it I don't think I can enjoy any Arnold movies due to the lack of detailed struggle and learning montages
HOW DID HE DEFEAT AN ALIEN HUNTER WITHOUT ANY TRAINING
HOW DID HE DEFEAT AN ALIEN HUNTER WITHOUT ANY TRAINING
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prag16
Banned
zzzzzzz
Most Arnold movies start out with him as already established in whatever capacity he needs to perform for the plot.
But I think you already know this is a poor comparison to the discussion at hand, and are likely being deliberately obtuse.
MoFuzz
Member
Iconic 80's action heroes shouldn't be stacked up against the character progression of a protagonist who is supposed to go on the hero's journey and is the subject of their own trilogy. One is supposed to have some semblance of development and change. In the other case, it's optional.
As prag16 pointed out, why did you even bother?
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The more I consider the movie the more I appreciate it lol.
I mean I understand the complaints, but they don't bug me the same way a sort it does the bigger detractors.
I purchased it and my first rewatch was actually with directors commentary. Interestingly, Rian addresses many points and sort of skips others (I mean that's expected, the movie for better or worse encompasses more than a 2.5 hour discussion), with the commentary being recorded BEFORE the movie was released. He sounds so excited about it such that it makes me wonder how differentl it would have been had he recorded it with more of the negative opinions under his belt.
Some of the plots do seem a bit subtle to the point where you might consider whether it was deliberate or accidental, but after the commentary and deleted scenes it's clear to me they were intentional (and some would say a failure because of that).
For example, it's clear to me now that the whole subplot with Finn and rose was to serve Finn's arc of going from a character that doesn't care for the war to one that actively participates, and that his quest with Rose is what changes him. In one deleted scene he clearly says that he never joined the resistance.
Taking some of that stuff out must be a hard thing to do. I know people will say "and we got titty milk instead of that", but I also se that if you make everything serve the plot and only in seriousness you do lose a bit of the fun. Like you could cut a lot of threepio out and into wouldnt change much, but it would be much less "Star Wars" for it.
I mean I understand the complaints, but they don't bug me the same way a sort it does the bigger detractors.
I purchased it and my first rewatch was actually with directors commentary. Interestingly, Rian addresses many points and sort of skips others (I mean that's expected, the movie for better or worse encompasses more than a 2.5 hour discussion), with the commentary being recorded BEFORE the movie was released. He sounds so excited about it such that it makes me wonder how differentl it would have been had he recorded it with more of the negative opinions under his belt.
Some of the plots do seem a bit subtle to the point where you might consider whether it was deliberate or accidental, but after the commentary and deleted scenes it's clear to me they were intentional (and some would say a failure because of that).
For example, it's clear to me now that the whole subplot with Finn and rose was to serve Finn's arc of going from a character that doesn't care for the war to one that actively participates, and that his quest with Rose is what changes him. In one deleted scene he clearly says that he never joined the resistance.
Taking some of that stuff out must be a hard thing to do. I know people will say "and we got titty milk instead of that", but I also se that if you make everything serve the plot and only in seriousness you do lose a bit of the fun. Like you could cut a lot of threepio out and into wouldnt change much, but it would be much less "Star Wars" for it.
gioGAF
Member
I like Rey, especially in TFA. In general, I don't get the complaints, she's very much like Luke. This new trilogy did not really go bad until TLJ. In the TFA, Rey did her thing, Finn did his thing, Poe did this thing, Hux/Kylo/Snoke did theirs. People can dislike this or that, but one thing is shared among them, they are competent (and IMO generally interesting and I was interested in learning more about them).
The Han/Leia dynamic was a little off, you could say Han was not where you would want him to be, but it was clear from the beginning that Harrison Ford wanted out, so he was included for the fans in all likelihood.
TLJ changes this. ALL of the male characters are stupid (except Kylo to some degree) and many of the things we wanted to find out about turned into dead ends or just plain uninteresting situations. Not to mention development of established characters is pushed to the side so we can get heavy doses of Rose and Admiral Holdo, wtf! Luke having an emotional moment, f' that, let's add more Holdo time, smh.
The Han/Leia dynamic was a little off, you could say Han was not where you would want him to be, but it was clear from the beginning that Harrison Ford wanted out, so he was included for the fans in all likelihood.
TLJ changes this. ALL of the male characters are stupid (except Kylo to some degree) and many of the things we wanted to find out about turned into dead ends or just plain uninteresting situations. Not to mention development of established characters is pushed to the side so we can get heavy doses of Rose and Admiral Holdo, wtf! Luke having an emotional moment, f' that, let's add more Holdo time, smh.
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Nicktendo86
Member
The problem for me is that feels like an afterthought of an explanation, the whole quest with Rose felt so much like just giving him something to do that doesn't mess with the general story too much as they couldn't fit him into the main plot, hence why he doesn't actually accomplish anything. A real shame as I like the character and they could have done some interesting things with an ex stormtrooper.
I wish they had him sacrifice himself at the end. It's clear they don't know what to do with him so might as well have given him an arc and made the character actually matter.
prag16
Banned
Not just Finn.. Do any of the new characters really have an arc in these movies?
Finn? I guess he learns to care about something bigger than himself, kind of?
Rey? No real progression of any kind.
Poe? Eh, I guess they hamfist the "learning to respect authority"thing in TLJ, but that's a stretch.
Kylo? Sort of, but he's still a dimestore Vader knockoff, same as he started out.
Snoke? Basically just a plot device.
Finn? I guess he learns to care about something bigger than himself, kind of?
Rey? No real progression of any kind.
Poe? Eh, I guess they hamfist the "learning to respect authority"thing in TLJ, but that's a stretch.
Kylo? Sort of, but he's still a dimestore Vader knockoff, same as he started out.
Snoke? Basically just a plot device.
OH-MyCar
Member
Yeah, I defended Rey in TFA. She was fundamentally no different than Anakin or Luke when, and only when, you gave them the benefit of the doubt that the story was going to a great place. She didn't have to be the secret grandaughter of Obi Wan and Satine Kyrze of Mandalore (although that would've been cool) and she didn't have to be a Skywalker. To me, the answer just had to be more rewarding than "Oh she's a nobody and the Force is automatically leveling her up".
We didn't have enough information to know that Rey was a "Mary Sue" in TFA. Now, TLJ retroactively made her a Mary Sue in TFA. If they weasel their way out of this in the script for IX, it already won't be half as rewarding because TLJ pretty much blew the entire ST's budget on lame, unearned gotchas. The middle chapter was the moment to get us truly invested in Rey but they dropped that ball from Cloud City.
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That's my only issue with Rey too. I actually like her as a character quite a bit, and went into TLJ assuming she was hyper-force sensitive (and wondering if Leia was her mom), force trained as a child, and that it was coming back to her slowly while under stress. Then I saw the movie and she received no training, and we got no back story. Hopefully they right the ship in the next one and provide the backstory / training that the first six movies made clear are vital for even highly force sensitive people. If someone wants to hate her for being female that's on them and their loss. But if Disney chooses to keep shitting on the concept of Jedi and Sith learning to use the force, apprenticeships, padawan, jedi vs. jedi master, etc., that is Disney's loss when their core fans stop caring because the goal posts moved too far.
Yeah I can see that. I just listened to the director commentary, which was recorded before release, and Rian seems to have everything laid out exactly as he wants.
The more I see this film the more I appreciate it. I've seen it twice at the theatres and once with commentary now, and at the first time it felt like the whole Finn and Rose side quest was a little weird in terms of them being able to sneak out and back in while the chase was going on, but I've come to appreciate its place in the story and more importantly Finn's arc.
Rose is the one fully invested in the resistance since her childhood was about the first order having controlled and destroyed it, and double downed with her sisters death. And it's her angle that rubs off on Finn leading up to him committing - I personally hadn't noticed that while he had defected, he technically hadn't joined the resistance.
Maybe that's on Rian. There are quite a few deleted scenes with Finn.
I still find the idea of a defected storm trooper to be compelling and I'm still hoping it comes to something bigger by the end.
Overall, I personally love all the subversion. All I wanted from last Jedi was that they don't just have a "soft remake" kind of story like they did with force awakens (even though I possibly like that movie more and acknowledge they sort of had to do what they did to revive the franchise).
I always read fanfic-style ideas and most of them make me cringe. It's fun For the sake Of discussion, but don't often think they are actually good ideas.
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kunonabi
Member
eh, I don't know about that. Luke and Anakin were constantly having failures and setbacks, getting ignored, reprimanded by other characters, and didn't have the wide variety of skills that Rey started with.
Luke is outwitted by R2D2, gets knocked out by sand people, laughed off by Han when he suggests flying to Alderaan himself, put on his ass in the cantina, and gets grabbed by the monster in garbage compactor. He's not particularly skilled at anything at this point except the flying, which going by ESB he isn't all that amazing at in the big scheme of things. He has a big triumphant moment at the end, with help from Han, but the rest of the movie doesn't really elevate him all that much.
Anakin does win the pod race and knock out the control ship but those weren't walks in the park either. He had never even finished a pod race up to that point and he managed to stall out at the start of the race resulting in an entire stadium laughing at him. The council refuses to train him despite his affinity for the force, and he ends up in the final space battle pretty much by accident and the only reason he manages to blow up the droid control ship is because he got SHOT DOWN.
That's just in their first films and not even going into how they struggled in their subsequent outings.
Rey on the other hand can speak droid despite stumbling on BB-8 being a big deal, can fly and fix the Falcon better than Han and Chewie, and uses the force at a level far beyond Luke. I mean, the movie starts out showing Kylo Ren using the force in ways more advanced than we've seen in the original six films and Rey fairly casually resists his mind probe and beats in him a duel. I know the whole blaster bolt/grief angle but he was still capable of tooling Finn in this state and Rey has still never used a lightsaber or applied the force for combat at this point. She just flips a switch and takes him out. If it was just one or two of these things it wouldn't be so bad but the casual way she goes about it just makes everyone else look incompetent. In the OT we had characters with specific strengths and skills so they could all contribute. We don't have that in the these new films as Rey doesn't need anybody else because she can already do what they do and do it better. Hell, in a couple of days she learns wookie and has to translate for freaking Luke.
Even if she isn't a Mary Sue she still suffers from the terrible kind of writing that made Lana Lang so insufferable on Smallville.
MoFuzz
Member
I think with the popularity of something like Game of Thrones which is built entirely on subverting expectations, there absolutely could have been something new and interesting done with Star Wars. If it is executed well, people would surely have bought into it. It really has to be something excellent for it to warrant the big switch though. That's where I feel like things faltered.
In my view, there are two main reasons for why this didn't work in The Last Jedi. Game of Thrones is an original franchise with no ties to other established stories. It is a subversion of genre as a whole, both in the fantasy setting and the manner of storytelling with tropes and conventions. You had moral ambiguity, and real stakes, with characters being threatened by actual danger and even death if the story called for it and the plot was driven forward as a result. People have bought it up in droves and HBO has a colossal hit on their hands. By comparison, Star Wars is probably the single biggest media property ever, and has existed for 40 years. With something that established and that specific, people weren't going to take kindly when you just rewrite the rules of how the force works, as one example, and utilizing something like hyperdrives for weaponry, as another. This was done while trying to pass it off as a continuation of the old stories. These two ideologies don't jive with one another. In reality, they should have just started far away from the Skywalker saga if they wanted to do something different and go by their own playbook. Either make a sequel and follow the established rules, or make your silly reboot or soft remake and leave Luke, Han & Leia well enough alone. Lucasfilm & Disney wanted it both ways.
Second, I would argue that the subversion in this movie exists purely for the sake of trying to be different, but it doesn't actually take anything in bold new directions, away from what we've already seen. In fact, the movie still essentially copies entire story beats from both Empire Strikes Back (Rebels on the run, young jedi training with the mentor, Hoth/Crait) and Return of the Jedi (Throne Room and the lead up to it). It just ends up being a strange mish mash of both, without the connective tissue that makes it stand firm on its own. They hinted at this somewhat with Kylo's dialogue to Rey after killing Snoke, and the possibility of Jedi and Sith both being pointless, so a new path was needed by conforming to neither and fighting for their own new cause, blazing a new trail, much like what they wanted to do with these movies. *This film tries to be so meta, that it hurts my head at times, by the way.* Sadly, in the very next sequence, not 10 minutes afterwards, it's right back to big bad guys blasting the small band of rebels. So, it just ends up coming across as rather pointless. If you're going to take something away that has been tried and proven, it has to be replaced by something in its place that is at least approaching equal or at least compelling enough for me to see how it pans out. Instead, they just killed all of the setups that the previous movie tried to hint at, and wanted a bunch of fresh new payoffs for what was never even suggested to begin with (Leia's powers, Holdo's light speed ram, Broom Boy at the end of the movie, etc. )
There were no little clues or foreshadowing you could pick up on in a rewatch, just a bunch of characters deciding to be incompetent, making poor decisions because that was what the plot demanded. You mentioned the angle of Finn as a storm trooper. I literally forgot all of that because John Boyega may as well have been someone else in this movie. They didn't sprinkle in his past or traits in that respect. How cool would it have been to see Star Wars in a movie from the eyes of a defected Stormtrooper? That would have been a lot more compelling to me than a silly anti-capitalist message on a casino planet.
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For sure.
The deleted scenes had a bunch more Finn stuff, including getting recognised by another storm trooper during the their infiltration (André i know that would've been beem picked apart as well like "what are the odds of running into someone's you know"), as well as Finn calling phasma out in front of her troops as the one who bent under pressure to turn off the shields at star killer base.
My point is none of that stuff was forgotten and a lot of it was painstakingly considered during writing. I guess you argue that it was the wrong stuff to take out in the cutting room, but I mostly agree with the decisions.
On rewatch I actually have found more to like (or maybe less to dislike). I kind of hate blatant political pandering in this kind of movie such as what you say about the anti-capitalist type stuff, but it kind of dissolves away and makes sense on repeat viewing amd is more sort of "hey isn't this an interesting viewpoint?" Deal (even though I think kinda of isn't except outside dj's involvement).
But yeah I don't mind it a small much just overall.
Inherently last jedi isn't quite as rewatchablr as many of the other star wars movies but I at I'll appreciate it for doing what it does and is a solid entry.
Grinchy
Banned
They're lucky that the prison there is so progressive that it houses men and women together, and that there happens to be another master codebreaker inside the cell who only hadn't escaped yet because he was asleep.
It really would have been better if we just saw them hatch a sweet plan that pays off and they are able to meet up with the original codebreaker. What was the point of making it so stupid?
Musky_Cheese
Banned
I didn't like the movie. In fact, I like TFA less now because of TLJ. It's so disappointing to hear people say "if you didn't like TLJ, it's because you hate or are threatened by women".
So as a fan of the franchise, being disappointed by the nothing they've done with Captain Phasma is fans hating women? They cast Gwendoline Christie, a wonderful actor and give cool armor... and do nothing with the character. It sucks. Feels like a waste of a cool character and great actor.
Kylo Ren is maybe an interesting character. But THE villain... no. He's not threatening, and hasn't done anything powerful since second act of TFA. His weakness as a villain brings down Snoke as well.
And hasn't Star Wars had hero females that changed the galaxy since 1977? Why are we now hating on women?
I did like Rouge One a lot. Think it's the 3rd best Star Wars they've made so far. Also had a female hero
So as a fan of the franchise, being disappointed by the nothing they've done with Captain Phasma is fans hating women? They cast Gwendoline Christie, a wonderful actor and give cool armor... and do nothing with the character. It sucks. Feels like a waste of a cool character and great actor.
Kylo Ren is maybe an interesting character. But THE villain... no. He's not threatening, and hasn't done anything powerful since second act of TFA. His weakness as a villain brings down Snoke as well.
And hasn't Star Wars had hero females that changed the galaxy since 1977? Why are we now hating on women?
I did like Rouge One a lot. Think it's the 3rd best Star Wars they've made so far. Also had a female hero
MoFuzz
Member
lol, yep. The movie is full of contrivances like this. Specifically, they get tossed in prison because of the parking violation. That's where they meet DJ, who also happens to be in the same cell of the same prison, who also happens to be a code breaker, who also happens to be a pilot/hijacker and who also acts as their ticket off the planet.
Once they're onboard the Supremacy, they make all the right steps, and are able to blend in with their disguises but essentially fail the mission because Evil BB-8 spots them while randomly patrolling around a gigantic ship and just so happens to see what they're up to at a very specific point in time, in a very specific place.
I could literally go on and on, but you get the idea.
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It's interesting that some such contrivances gets a pass in some movies and not in others. Like the same sort of contrivances are abundant in Dark Knight and is what makes it sort of a downer for me. I guess it's a personal thing how much it bugs you and how good the rest of the movie is to have you forgive it.
I don't minds in Last Jedi as such, there's plenty in the whole saga, but what does bug me about it is that the code breaker they didn't get ends up being a turncoat and results directly in Holdo's plan backfiring and getting most of the survivors killed.
It's not that Finn and rose (and Poe) failed, but that their actions actually caused a lot of death, with little gain. The beginning bomber loss I get, they took down a dreadnought. But that code breaker....
They really did fail hard.
Musky_Cheese
Banned
Had Dr. Sadler not kept the plan super top secret from everyone, there wouldn't have been a movie. Those captains that died with the ships running out of fuel, could have left with the rest of the crew. Hell, even Sadler didn't need to stay with the ship... they got droids.
Rey's time with Luke (other than getting the books) was a complete waste of time. Nothing happened there.
What can Luke really teach Rey anyway? Luke, Obi-Wan, Anakin... they are all stupid. Taking years and decades training. They should have just not trained and done what Rey did.
Rey's time with Luke (other than getting the books) was a complete waste of time. Nothing happened there.
What can Luke really teach Rey anyway? Luke, Obi-Wan, Anakin... they are all stupid. Taking years and decades training. They should have just not trained and done what Rey did.
kunonabi
Member
To be fair Rey has the benefit of the force apparently going out of its way to match power levels for the light and dark sides of the force. This flies in the face of how the force was presented in the prequels but oh well.
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MoFuzz
Member
How dare you suggest that an entire crew of resistance members not blindly follow repeatedly questionable decisions and poor leadership? You would try to take away her heroic act of self sacrifice from her? Ridiculous!
How dare you suggest that Rey should actually develop with growth and progression leading to a satisfying narrative payoff?
You must be a sexist, cheeto-fingered, intolerant neckbeard who's bitter that their head canon wasn't fulfilled. Plus, critics loved it, so that means it was good.
Signed,
- Mainstream Media, and Half of the Internet
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OH-MyCar
Member
Everything about Admiral Diane/Saddler's big sacrifice feels like it was written for Leia and was scrapped in the first draft (because the film itself couldn't be more than draft 1.5). Now everyone is talking about the "brilliant" visual foreshadowing of Leia passing through the Dreadnaught's hologram as she flies back to the ship, but to me that even further solidifies that everything was pointing towards that moment being for Leia. Holdo is completely redundant, stepping over Leia's material to the extent that you had to knock Leia out for her to get her scenes.
Of course even if it was indeed Leia's sacrifice in earlier drafts, it doesn't help the confusing theme of "Let's not kill anyone but protect who we love through non-violence, except for when we Pearl Harbor an entire fleet at once" or the fact that yes, they have droids. Maybe the droids were running out of fuel.
You could argue the droid thing for the entire saga really.
I tend not to go there.
I mean there are robot bounty hunters, why not robot pilots to take out the deathstar? Why not send out R2? I mean BB8 seems pretty capable. They had droid armies in the prequels.
There's ALWAYS an excuse to make, sure, but ultimately it's just about the surface story and a bit of fantasy fun in space. Everything falls apart (and also everything can Be explained if you want to) on examination, but I don't think it's supposed to be held up to that kind of scrutiny.
FOR sure there is an audience that does demand that and that's fine. Every viewer has their own requirements for enjoyment.
Is it all being an apologist for "bad movie-making"? Eh maybe. I had fun. Still am!
I tend not to go there.
I mean there are robot bounty hunters, why not robot pilots to take out the deathstar? Why not send out R2? I mean BB8 seems pretty capable. They had droid armies in the prequels.
There's ALWAYS an excuse to make, sure, but ultimately it's just about the surface story and a bit of fantasy fun in space. Everything falls apart (and also everything can Be explained if you want to) on examination, but I don't think it's supposed to be held up to that kind of scrutiny.
FOR sure there is an audience that does demand that and that's fine. Every viewer has their own requirements for enjoyment.
Is it all being an apologist for "bad movie-making"? Eh maybe. I had fun. Still am!
OH-MyCar
Member
That's probably true. I guess the thing that gets people nitpicking over the Holdo thing so much is that it was a visually striking scene but it didn't have much weight to it for a lot of people. You introduce a character, suggest she may even be a spy herself and then give her a big emotional send-off that doesn't quite land. Even as someone who doesn't like the film, I'd concede that a lot of us probably nitpick the "logic" on these things because they weren't very emotionally satisfying on a personal level. Why did Palpatine just stand there and throw his hands in the air when Vader threw him into the pit? Few of us question that because it was such a powerful scene; one of the best in the franchise.
So, in a way it's probably just a method for a lot of us to get catharsis.