TLJ answered things, it was just in an unexpected way. It also opened up the doors for Star Wars to do something different for once.
No, it didn’t.
It was movie 8 of a 9 film saga, and part 2 of a 3 part trilogy.
All it did was kill any momentum from TFA for Rey and Finn, the more important characters, give Luke a sad epilogue that ultimately didn’t add anything major to the plot of the Sequel Trilogy, and leave the First Order handicapped as a villainous faction by making them idiots, then putting a still immature and now less threatening Kylo in charge, who it also wants the audience to care about more than is warranted.
When people say they wanted Star Wars to go somewhere new, or do something different, I always wonder if they know that Rogue One came out. Or that Knights of the Old Republic was a thing.
Because Star Wars was already doing other stuff if you found the Skywalker Saga boring or predictable. The only thing TLJ did was out all the resonance of the family story on the neo-Nazi mass murderer, patricide, and would-be mind rapist... at the expense of the actual main characters of the ST.
Because TLJ is ironically the most Skywalker obsessed film of the ST, the one that banishes the non-Skywalker heroes from the final climax.
It’s also even more dogmatically dedicated to recreating the “Empire vs Rebels” thing than TFA was, weirdly; there sure as hell isn't anything new there.
Rey and Finn mattered more to this Trilogy than Luke did, as weird as that my sound, and both mattered far more than Kylo. But TLJ was interest only in those two.
I got the impression that Jannah was created as a romantic interest for Finn, as Rey was intended to be a virginal Force God (quote from an article I read online believe it or not) and Rose was shafted because a load of bigots hated her.
Alternatively...
Finn was meant to be Rey’s love interest when created (thus why they have the best relationship in any of movies during TFA).
Then TLJ wanted Rey to be Kylo abused girlfriend for no good reason, and introduced a not-Rey alternative for Finn, but fundamentally failed to make Rose value to the audience beyond KMT’s skills when she was still shackled by bad and boring writing.
Then Abrams gets stuck having to honor the trashy version of Reylo from TLJ in TROS (it didn’t have to be trashy or abusive, but TLJ made it so, and nothing else), but found Rose just kind of a boring character, so he substituted in a character more similar to Rey.
So it’s three screwups: Johnson breaking apart one good relationship for two bad ones, failing to make his newest character good, then Abrams refusing to rehabilitate Rose, which would have been the better move.
Rey being a nobody, I see that as being an answer, it's just an answer you either love or hate. Personally, I thought it was a great way to show not everybody needs to be born and bred from a skywalker. The only reason people thought they were significant is because I think star wars fans, as a whole, also expect setups like that. The Force Awakens, intentionally or not, did set that up and thats not a bad thing.
...and then TLJ rigidly treated only Skywalkers as mattering to the story, which is why Rey gets stuck acting as an audience member when Luke’s around and turned into a plot tool to advance Kylo’s story and worship the idea he’s sympathetic when he’s... well, just saying “Not” wouldn’t be hard enough to describe how loathsome he is.
And TLJ has the temerity to argue that his feelings matter more than her or her friends suffering.
Meanwhile, Finn, a character who was indisputably always meant to be the non-Skywalker hero once he was created from the splitting of the first draft’s male lead... gets shuffled off to have no impact on the plot.
Meanwhile, Luke and Kylo get the climax all to themselves.
TLJ is the
worst possible proponent of any kind of Everyman message, and actually punishes Rey for not being a Skywalker.
It may not have been the intention of Johnson, but he had a Skywalker tell the main hero: “You’re no one...” and effectively banish her from having her story matter to the film afterwards. He goes on to face legendary hero Luke Skywalker, who’s story has focused more on him than on Rey, while she becomes a glorified Uber driver with Chewie, who doesn’t even get a scene to show her facing the conundrum of a knocked out mass murder who’s just redeclared his intent to kill her friends and rule the Galaxy with an iron fist...
...Because t9 TLJ, who cares what a non-Skywalker thinks?
It's because in this story, what means to the narrative makes sense. If trying to say something about being special without a special lineage. The Rise of Skywalker tries to say that same thing, but the source of her power is directly related to her blood.
And again, TLJ only cared about the Skywalker for its climax...
...And TLJ just said her source of power is directly related to the dude who tried to mind-rape her.
She’s dependent on a previous character regardless. Its basically elitism (which Kylo has for himself) or victimization.
And her’s kind of my thing, in agreement with this post:
That doesn't connect with who her character is established as. She's not seeking validation in the previous, to the point that she outright disregards her mentor figure Han to go back to jakku and none of this connects to her parents or why she'd think her parents being special adds to her story in regards to this and them being somebody.
TLJ neutered it’s own version of Rey by taking what was a character focused question that has major impact on Rey’s established character (“Why won’t my parents come back for
me?”) by changing the question into one that bases her character off of others (“Who were my
parents?”)
TFA could afford to say “I’m sorry, we don’t know,
you have to move past that,” and then have Rey, as a character, deal with that answer for the rest of the film.
TLJ answered it’s question as “Nobody...” and instead of giving her a part of the film to deal with there, shoved her out of the way.
