spoilers [SPOILERS] Star Wars: Rise of Skywalker

[Kalbear]

5 minutes ago, Raksha 2014 said:

When a friend of mine, with whom I was hoping to go see the movie, said she didn't want to see it, I gave up on seeing it in a movie theater and decided to wait until it came out on TV.  Then I went to Wikipedia and read the plot summary, especially the ending.

Lot of people said that when Avengers Endgame's synopsis leaked and how stupid it sounded, but turns out that it's hard to capture emotional and action beats in a wikipedia entry, or the comedy bits.  I mean, sure, do whatever you want, no worries, but most action movies sound pretty stupid when you just write out their plots. Pretty sure John Wick would be incredibly bad, as an example. 

[sologdin]

establish that a new Jedi Order was needed or would be built

dunno. she's got the best ship in scifi and a new yellow sword and a robot who looks like a vacuum cleaner--seems ready to bring it around town, yaknow? all she needs to do is grab R2 and chewbacca and ahsoka off the ghost.  the ambiguity provides flexibility for future writers.  

[Lord Varys]

17 minutes ago, Raksha 2014 said:

To kill off all our heroes, i.e. the Skywalker/Solo clan, wipe their family line from the mythos, and set up Palpatine's granddaughter as the new (and only) Skywalker, is indeed a slap in the face to George Lucas; the man without whom there would be no Star Wars movies at all.  

It is also a slap in the face of the many people who cared about the characters for so long. I mean, I am a little bit of a freak here. I read Star Wars literature since the mid-1990s. I essentially own the entire 'Legends EU' (and most of that in two languages).

I was not happy when there was talk about a third trilogy, one that would burn the continuity I had been reading for about twenty years. The thing had reached a point when you were not buying a novel or a comic or a computer game with each new work but rather another piece in a very large puzzle. That was really something special.

That announcement aside, even I could have liked the new thing if they had told a good story - or even a better story than they did previously. But they did not.

And now all those new movies did was essentially to kill Han Solo, Luke Skywalker, and Leia Organa (who never was Leia Organa Solo in that universe, anyway).

Even that wouldn't have been that bad had they actually accomplished something - them having children to continue the family would also have been nice, but even that didn't have to be the case. I mean, Jedi didn't have children back in the Jedi Order the PT established, so perhaps Luke and Leia both chose not to have children (although it would have always been great to have Han and Leia to have a couple of children). But them essentially being completely unable to do anything of note, to give the galaxy they (supposedly) saved from Emperor Palpatine and Darth Vader anything lasting is pretty mean. No New Republic, no new Jedi Order, nor lasting peace - essentially no hope. ANH should have been better titled 'A VAIN HOPE' or 'A FOOLISH HOPE'.

In a sense this whole setting feels as if ANH had opened up with there being a New Republic and there being some trade cartels having issues with the taxation on those blasted routes to the outlying systems, with the Galactic Empire thing the Palpatine dude tried to build in the last three movies had disappeared into nothingness in the two decades between the trilogies, becoming something of an obscure footnote in galactic histories.

Overall, the flaw with those new movies is simply the very basic story/approach they took. Copying ANH. Throw the audience in medias res, doing a story from the perspective of the average people who don't know shit about the world they live in.

Doing that when you are actually making a movie in a rather broad fictional universe makes little sense - especially when you can, more or less, actually assume that a considerable amount of the audience knowing those movies would actually want to see what happened to the characters they last had news of in 1982.

The approach of your movie in such a setting has to be to start with them, to reintroduce them as quickly as you can, and then show the story and the universe around them, introducing new main characters along with them.

If you want to jump ahead in time to have a blank slate - then do jump far enough that the old guard are all dead. In the EU this was done quite nicely with the Legacy era comics, which took place a hundred years after the Yuuzhan Vong war, i.e. 125 years after ANH. There are still Skywalkers and Solos in that era, but Luke, Han, and Leia are all dead.

17 minutes ago, Raksha 2014 said:

I like Rey as a character, and am glad that she lived.  But they could have given Han and Leia one or two other children who lived and were not corrupted, or given Luke a child.  And bringing back Palpatine seems stupid.

Palpatine coming back could have worked, if that really been the theme of the entire movies. In fact, then even some descendants of his could have been a nice idea. It could have been interesting to explore the character in more depth, for instance the why part of his personal motivation. Him surviving death somehow could have left scars on his psyche and could also have changed his priorities somewhat, etc. And one could certainly have also intertwined such a story with Luke - who clearly would have been the guy most interested in a returned Emperor being the OT character who interacted with him the most - but we can also assume that Leia would have known him to some degree, with her being an Imperial Senator when ANH begins.

And insofar as Rey is concerned - I'd have actually found it more poignant if it had been 'The Rise of Palpatine' and Rey would have been Rey Palpatine in the end - with the message that family lines do not determine which side of the Force you have to join, etc. and also that you don't have to shed your birth name or give it up to have an identity of your own.

The message that Rey being essentially an orphan without a family most of her life deciding herself who she wants to be is a good story - but there is still the somewhat stale taste in your mouth that she gives up the name her father apparently also had because of what her grandfather did. And while that would be understandable if she were to be a public figure of sorts (which she definitely isn't in the end) it is sort of sad that she may feel to do that even as a private person.

[I mean, here in Germany famous Nazi descendants also change their names - and it is understandable why they would - but we would also say that in an enlightened society they should not have to do this. You are not responsible for the actions of your ancestors.]

17 minutes ago, Raksha 2014 said:

I probably should have realized that the Star Wars franchise would end badly when they killed off Luke in The Last Jedi.  Luke should have survived to train more Jedi and have some peace and fulfillment in his old age.

Definitely yeah, but even if he had died in the trilogy - they could have spared his death for the final movie, not to mention him already having established a Jedi Order. They could have even had him been disillusioned with them, etc. if there was some good reason for that (as it happens there were none such reasons given).

I mean, if they want to waste the first movie searching for Luke Skywalker (a ridiculous plot) then why not make it about him missing for a good reason and his absence actually causing trouble to his Jedi Order and other related issues.

[Centrist Simon Steele]

On 12/20/2019 at 3:57 AM, Soylent Brown said:

Yeah, and with Leia's body disappearing at the time time, it was a nice way of showing their family becoming whole again.

 

Overall I liked it. It wasn't perfect by any means, but still.

I really wanted Rey to have a green lightsaber though. Disappointed with the all blue affair.

That's the one thing I don't get. Not only were they telegraphing a blue and green showdown with the Emperor, but they even showed Luke with his green lightsaber in a flashback! When Rey gave hers to Ben and it was blue, I was like, "Okay, I guess she has the green one..." and then she whips out a blue one, and I was confused. I kept thinking maybe she didn't really give her lightsaber to Ben, but it was some kind of trick within a trick, and the green one would show up...

...but no. No green one. My son explained to me on the way to the car that it definitely made sense. I disagree. The only plot hole I can find.

[Centrist Simon Steele]

On 12/20/2019 at 10:40 AM, Tywin et al. said:

Thanks. I’ll check them out later. But that said, I think the best comments I’ve heard are people prefacing their opinion with “I didn’t hate it, but.”  

I loved it. The entire thing.

[Jeor]

On a completely random note, I looked up Billy Dee Williams' age and that guy is 82 years old! He looks amazing for an octogenarian.

A day later I've now reflected that I think different use of Leia's character could have done a whole lot to improve the film. A bigger role for her would have knitted a lot of things together and lent a whole lot more emotional weight to the film; we just don't care about the new characters as much. It would have meant recasting Leia, but I think she could have been involved in a lot more:

• She could have redeemed Ben by herself rather than the weird Han hallucination. Although I understand the desire to get Harrison Ford in here, there were audible gasps and "What?" going on in the cinema when Han appeared, and he can't be a Force ghost either.
• They could have amplified the master/apprentice training connection between Rey and Leia, so that it was Leia's training and love for Rey that helped her at the end rather than all these old Jedi in her head that Rey never knew. Leia's character could have grounded Rey a lot more and had more of that visible tug of war between Skywalkers/Palpatines.
• Lando/Leia working together would have been a bit of fan service but also a much more potent emotional punch. See these two old warhorses working out a plan for the fleet to help out "the kids" on the ground, her making one last final appeal for rebel help across the galaxy, etc.
• If one of the Big Three (i.e. Leia) had survived at the end, there would have been more hope that the mistakes of the past wouldn't be repeated. As it is, there's no reason to believe that this is basically another RotJ where someone else can raise the Empire again.

Those are just personal preferences, so I know not everyone will agree with them, but I think we needed to see more Leia.

[Corvinus85]

27 minutes ago, Simon Steele said:

That's the one thing I don't get. Not only were they telegraphing a blue and green showdown with the Emperor, but they even showed Luke with his green lightsaber in a flashback! When Rey gave hers to Ben and it was blue, I was like, "Okay, I guess she has the green one..." and then she whips out a blue one, and I was confused. I kept thinking maybe she didn't really give her lightsaber to Ben, but it was some kind of trick within a trick, and the green one would show up...

...but no. No green one. My son explained to me on the way to the car that it definitely made sense. I disagree. The only plot hole I can find.

The other blue lightsaber was Leia's.

[Centrist Simon Steele]

9 minutes ago, Corvinus said:

The other blue lightsaber was Leia's.

I know I know but...I just can't get my mind away from having the green one back.

[Corvinus85]

10 minutes ago, Simon Steele said:

I know I know but...I just can't get my mind away from having the green one back.

I kept wanting Rey to have a double-blade saber, and the only we got was for Empress Rey. When she got Leia's saber, I thought to myself Finally! but it wasn't to be.

[Guest]

Took the kids to see it last night, and I'm just...ugh. Like this movie was made only for the loudest, most toxic parts of the fanbase.

Sidelining Kelly Marie Tran because a bunch of incel fucksticks couldn't handle Rose was just a new low. 

And despite it all, there was a moment I thought that somehow, miraculously, Abrams had stuck the landing. After Rey kills Palpatine and then dies, and Kylo climbs up to try and bring her back to life, I was thinking: "They did it! Anakin fulfilled the prophecy of bringing balance to the force (albeit indirectly) because the last Jedi killed the last Sith, sacrificing herself in the process, and the only remaining trained force user is a grey Jedi, who now has to endure the mistrust of all sides as he tries to integrate himself back into Galactic society!"

But...then they fucked it all up. Kylo brings her back to life, and then fucks off and dies, and it just ruined all of it.

This movie had some amazing moments. Adam Driver is amazing. The lightsaber duel on the ruins of the Death Star with the crashing waves was awesome. The force-link between Rey and Kylo continued to be an great new way to use the Force.

But...Palpatine's granddaughter? Really? The retcons in this movie not only ruined this movie, but somehow made me like TLJ less (my 3rd favorite in the entire series, and probably would have been number 2 if Johnson had cut the Canto Bight sequence) just because of how they had to pander to the people who complained about the Holdo maneuver to the point where Poe has to explain why it's a bad idea to kamikaze command ships into Star Destroyers (pro-tip:  why doesn't the U.S. just kamikaze it's aircraft carriers into other ships during war? Because they're way more useful as something other than a battering ram).

Also, and giving credit where it's due, as I got this from Chris Stuckmann's spoiler review, but the return of Palpatine in a lot of ways negates Anakin's turn back to the light in ROTJ.

There was a lot that I liked about this movie, but the bad stuff was just SO bad.

[Corvinus85]

I thought the force link between Rey and Ben went overboard with all the teleporting objects. I suppose the next step is for a powerful force user to just teleport to planets and screw lightspeed ships. This is essentially what JJ did in Star Trek but with tech.

[Raja]

6 hours ago, polishgenius said:

 Killing Chewie, that would have been bold, but nooooo. 

Yeah, I think the film lacked any sort of conviction in what it was doing. It is especially strange & a pity as I think that scene with Kylo & Rey in the desert using the force on the transport ship is one of the stronger scenes in the movie.

@The Great Unwashed The Kelly Marie Tran thing is so strange especially in light of these comments by JJ - I don't know what on earth was going on with that decision - and you know, JJ is the one responsible for wrapping up this story, so I don't mind if he wanted to go in this particular direction, but the execution of Naomi Ackie's character, with her being such a cipher, is a let down.

[Guest]

1 hour ago, Jeor said:

On a completely random note, I looked up Billy Dee Williams' age and that guy is 82 years old! He looks amazing for an octogenarian.

A day later I've now reflected that I think different use of Leia's character could have done a whole lot to improve the film. A bigger role for her would have knitted a lot of things together and lent a whole lot more emotional weight to the film; we just don't care about the new characters as much. It would have meant recasting Leia, but I think she could have been involved in a lot more:

• She could have redeemed Ben by herself rather than the weird Han hallucination. Although I understand the desire to get Harrison Ford in here, there were audible gasps and "What?" going on in the cinema when Han appeared, and he can't be a Force ghost either.
• They could have amplified the master/apprentice training connection between Rey and Leia, so that it was Leia's training and love for Rey that helped her at the end rather than all these old Jedi in her head that Rey never knew. Leia's character could have grounded Rey a lot more and had more of that visible tug of war between Skywalkers/Palpatines.
• Lando/Leia working together would have been a bit of fan service but also a much more potent emotional punch. See these two old warhorses working out a plan for the fleet to help out "the kids" on the ground, her making one last final appeal for rebel help across the galaxy, etc.
• If one of the Big Three (i.e. Leia) had survived at the end, there would have been more hope that the mistakes of the past wouldn't be repeated. As it is, there's no reason to believe that this is basically another RotJ where someone else can raise the Empire again.

Those are just personal preferences, so I know not everyone will agree with them, but I think we needed to see more Leia.

I do agree that Fisher's tragic passing also greatly hamstrung what they were able to do with her interaction with other characters in the movie, but recasting Leia is just not possible.

If you think fans went apeshit from TLJ or this one, try recasting Leia, or anyone from the OT.

[DMC]

2 hours ago, Lord Varys said:

And now all those new movies did was essentially to kill Han Solo, Luke Skywalker, and Leia Organa (who never was Leia Organa Solo in that universe, anyway).

Even that wouldn't have been that bad had they actually accomplished something - them having children to continue the family would also have been nice, but even that didn't have to be the case. I mean, Jedi didn't have children back in the Jedi Order the PT established, so perhaps Luke and Leia both chose not to have children (although it would have always been great to have Han and Leia to have a couple of children).

I still haven't seen the movie, hopefully will in the next couple days.*  Obviously though, I'm not averse to spoilers, and have been following this thread.  Anyway, the criticism above seems particularly rich.  I have many issues with TLJ, but one thing Johnson did that's hard to argue with is democratizing the mystical powers of the force.  It seems decidedly monarchical that one family would have some type of predominance over the force based on midichlorians or whatever. 

I'll grant that Rey being Palpatine's granddaughter doesn't really decentralize force power too much (especially considering my headcanon is indeed, as others have mentioned, that Sheev is partly responsible for Anakin's immaculate conception), but this clear urge to have the Skywalkers continue the "family line" speaks volumes.  Who gives a shit?  If the force and its "balance" is contingent on one, or two, genetic lines to save the day or whatever, ya know what?  Fuck the force.  That's antithetical to what Star Wars is about to me.

*Thursday was spent heading to Florida to visit my family.  My brother, who I usually would watch this with, refuses after TLJ.  My sister and her husband seem kind of willing but that's pending, they're pretty busy between the two families over the holidays.  I may have to end up watching it with my mother while I'm here, which is pretty pathetic as a 34 year old, but I don't know anyone else here.

[Free Northman Reborn]

So bad. Where to begin.

Adam Driver reminds me of Napoleon Dynamite, just with long black hair. So awkward looking and the exact opposite of intimidating. The emo nerd version of Darth Vader.
 

So the Skywalker dynasty - highest midichlorian count ever/ ones who will bring balance to the Force are all dead then - turned out to be a red herring, the wrong fork in the road.

The Palpatine family, on the other hand, they starred in all THREE series and are the real heart of this entire saga. Well colour me not impressed.

In the end, if they could bring Palpatine back as the ultimate villain, then they could have brought Luke back as the ultimate hero. Instead, he ended up being an immense disappointment, greatest force achievement being lifting an X-wing out of the water - compared to Palpatine  bringing down an entire Rebel fleet from orbit with his Force lighting.

Like many -and more every day - I feel Disney have destroyed Star Wars as we knew it. The damn prequels were better than this shit.

 

[Ran]

 

5 hours ago, sologdin said:

dunno. she's got the best ship in scifi and a new yellow sword and a robot who looks like a vacuum cleaner--seems ready to bring it around town, yaknow? all she needs to do is grab R2 and chewbacca and ahsoka off the ghost.  the ambiguity provides flexibility for future writers.  

She also has the ancient Jedi texts, and one of her best friends is a Force-sensitive who could learn from her.

2 hours ago, The Great Unwashed said:

I do agree that Fisher's tragic passing also greatly hamstrung what they were able to do with her interaction with other characters in the movie, but recasting Leia is just not possible.

If you think fans went apeshit from TLJ or this one, try recasting Leia, or anyone from the OT.

This is right. Her role couldn't be recast without a huge firestorm. I think it's absolutely the case that the plan before her passing was for Leia to play a clearer and more direct role in Ben's redemption -- doubtless it'd be her Force spirit, not a dream-vision of Han, who would have spoken to him -- but alas, Carrie Fisher passed, and they did what they could within the framework of what they thought they could do.

 

[Ran]

4 hours ago, The Great Unwashed said:

(pro-tip:  why doesn't the U.S. just kamikaze it's aircraft carriers into other ships during war? Because they're way more useful as something other than a battering ram).

If the U.S. could sacrifice just one ship to guarantee the destruction of a Japanese fleet, and do it with the loss of just one life, that would probably have been a sacrifice worth making. Remember, in TLJ, most of the star destroyers in a  cone behind the ship that was hit were destroyed or seriously damaged -- it wasn't just a one-for-one trade.

I think the point people raised was that the "Holdo maneuver" seemed to undermine the course of war going forward in the Star Wars universe. No more doomsday weapons (too easy a target for this), and no super-capitals (also too easy), and large, closely-packed fleet formations (too easy a target). Why build huge ships to trade broadsides with one another and risk thousands of personnel when you could essentially grab a space rock, strap engines and a hyperdrive to it, and have it destroy vessels with the shrapnel that it produced when it smashed into another ship?

Getting rid of the "Holdo maneuver" as a wild fluke that can't be repeated will explain why space warfare in the Star Wars universe will keep the character of what came before.

 

ETA: That said, I saw one person commenting in an article that he thought he saw a moment seen through a window (presumably from Pryde's ship or the opening in the Sith temple or perhaps through a cockpit) where a Resistance ship or fighter tried to replicate the maneuver against a Final Order star destroyer. Not sure if that's true or not.

[HexMachina]

4 hours ago, Corvinus said:

I thought the force link between Rey and Ben went overboard with all the teleporting objects. I suppose the next step is for a powerful force user to just teleport to planets and screw lightspeed ships. This is essentially what JJ did in Star Trek but with tech.

Didnt Luke already set this up in TLJ, passing the dice to Leia from afar? (Genuinely can’t recall if they were real or a force projection too).

I had no problem with it though. Especially when you consider the bond between Rey and Ren as one in a million or whatever odds Palpatine said. Its been obvious they have a very strong bond and force connection throughout so having them do stuff like this works fine for me

[Ran]

3 minutes ago, HelenaExMachina said:

Didnt Luke already set this up in TLJ, passing the dice to Leia from afar? (Genuinely can’t recall if they were real or a force projection too).

Force projection. They fade away after he's gone.

3 minutes ago, HelenaExMachina said:

I had no problem with it though. Especially when you consider the bond between Rey and Ren as one in a million or whatever odds Palpatine said. Its been obvious they have a very strong bond and force connection throughout so having them do stuff like this works fine for me

I, too, have no problem with it. The dyad in the Force thing was, IMO, immensely clever on J.J.'s part, because it felt like, "Oh, of course!" even though it's a new concept. When they keep talking about balance, when you have these polar opposite light and dark sides, a nexus or focal point between them is just perfectly fitting with the already-established concept.

[polishgenius]

Yeah the whole Rey/Ren connection and being able to affect each other's locations/pass stuff through the force was the one thing in this movie that I thought JJ actually made a good decision with (apart from the little droid's arc). The fight scene with that was cool and the lightsaber pass was the one real 'fuck yeah' moment in the movie for me.