The Rise of Skywalker General Star Wars Episode IX News/Speculation Thread - Part 1

[Boom]

It's honestly baffling that they didn't.

 

[Kane52630]

Remember when this was supposed to badass and exciting?

 

[AVEITWITHJAMON]

To be fair, it was Johnson who totally did away with those guys.

 

[godisawesome]

Kylo being the big bad is so incredibly obviously the natural, most effective way for the story to play out. They were ****ed the moment they were too cowardly to invest in it.

It's honestly baffling that they didn't.

I don't think "cowardice" fits their reasoning, and its sadly not that surprising of a move for LFL - they're the type of TLJ fans who favored the "This is an improvement over TFA because Ben Solo is promoted over Finn, Rey is made reliant on him for her meaning, and he's the Best Boy!" interpretation of that movie. Hell, they may have even inspired it, since Johnson's blatant favoritism for him might have come from or been encouraged by Lucasfilm emphasizing they thought Driver should be the male lead and not really caring about Rey.

Kylo getting the promotion to Supreme Leader is really the only thing from TLJ actually showing interest in him as a villain; the film is diametrically opposed to Rey having a personal conflict with him caused by his numerous atrocities upon her and her friends personally, and in general just wants him treated like a sympathetic angsty teenager instead of as a Neo-Nazi School Shooter and pseudo-#MeToo perpetrator. And again... EVERYONE at LFL was happy to have him usurp Finn's place as the male lead and make Rey dependent on him for her personal connection to the Saga.

If they figured that Kylo killing Han in cold blood, maiming Finn, torturing and then violating the mind of Rey, and just always being psychotic didn't matter, than why would they think that him telling Rey "no" to another redemption offer would mean anything?

They clearly wanted him as the real main character, and didn't have the standards to make that work well or recognize how bad of an idea that was.

 

[BatLobster]

TLJ left the door wide open to have Kylo progress into the big bad, as evidenced in Trevorrow's script. How they chose to resolve his character arc was ultimately J.J.'s call.

Also, "neo nazi school shooter" analogy for Kylo doesn't quite work IMO, because we're talking about a franchise where his grandfather was basically Hitler and still found some sort of redemption in the end. Those 1:1 real world analogies just don't exactly apply here. Even Luke Skywalker is a mass murderer/terrorist when you really start trying to apply that kind of real world thinking to it.

The bind that Episode IX was in was, with Rey not being a Skywalker, they had to decide whether or not it would be too bleak to have the last actual Skywalker die as an evil, irredeemable monster. Whether or not you think that should've happened, you have to admit that is a pretty dark ending for a story that for all intents and purposes about the Skywalker family and would've probably been a severe bastardization of Lucas' saga, even moreso than the damage that was already done by Episodes VII and VIII.

I'm at the point where, while I can enjoy aspects of the ST, I view it mostly as fan fiction. The main Star Wars saga is Episodes I-VI for me. Bob Iger killed any remaining chance of the sequel trilogy being a truly authentic extension of the saga when he pushed Lucas out. I hate that I feel this way, because I reallllly wanted the ST to be great, and I always try to look for merit whenever I watch them. But I think the ST is some sort of metatextual riff on Star Wars made by fans of Star Wars...and it gets a lot of things "right" on the surface, but it's missing that deeper layer of authenticity IMO.

 

[godisawesome]

TLJ left the door wide open to have Kylo progress into the big bad, as evidenced in Trevorrow's script. How they chose to resolve his character arc was ultimately J.J.'s call.

Also, "neo nazi school shooter" analogy for Kylo doesn't quite work IMO, because we're talking about a franchise where his grandfather was basically Hitler and still found some sort of redemption in the end. Those 1:1 real world analogies just don't exactly apply here. Even Luke Skywalker is a mass murderer/terrorist when you really start trying to apply that kind of real world thinking to it.

The bind that Episode IX was in was, with Rey not being a Skywalker, they had to decide whether or not it would be too bleak to have the last actual Skywalker die as an evil, irredeemable monster. Whether or not you think that should've happened, you have to admit that is a pretty dark ending for a story that for all intents and purposes about the Skywalker family and would've probably been a severe bastardization of Lucas' saga, even moreso than the damage that was already done by Episodes VII and VIII.

Once you decree that Kylo's bloodline trumps everything else, as TLJ does, than of course he can't be the main villain - you've already sacrificed multiple other characters for the sake of his entitlement, why would you stop at sacrifcing the villainous part of him that you were denying he was in the first place?

LFL rejected Trevorrow and brought back Abrams on the condition of finding a way to get Ben Solo a hero moment against a bigger bad - so that wasn't Abrams's call, it was his charge from a bunch of Ben Solo fanboys in LFL, who had seen Trevorrow try to create a new villain for them in Sollony Ren, and had realized that wasn't going to work either.

And the "sacrilege" had already happened as had the "bastardization" of the Saga, thanks to vulnerabilities exposed by TFA and to desecration carried out gleefully by TLJ - particularly in the idealism and morality that underpins every other Star Wars film, even the pessimistic Rogue One.

The "bind" is unacceptable all by itself; the only real damn to give about Kylo is whether they completed an attempt to steal Rey's trilogy for him started in TLJ, managed to salvage her story by cutting her lose from him as a co-protagonist, or failed at both - and giving Kylo a last minute redemption in that scenario will fail at both regardless, which is why you've got an ending that does nothing for a parasitic character like Kylo and still handicaps Rey by making her share her trilogy with a parasite.

(We're also skipping over the part where Kylo fans already usurped Finn's position for Kylo back in TLJ, and just accepting that as a matter of course, which is also an indictment of TLJ, and evidence of how Kylo Ren is a blackhole more than a character.)

And of course the analogy about Kylo works - Vader being a Nazi mass murderer worked back in the OT because the story made sure to add to that factoid, rather than deny it, and no one can seriously pretend Luke is similar because of the clear morality in play.

Morality matters in star Wars, even if that's anathema to TLJ's entire thing.

 

[Enriquespy]

I'm not sure you watched the same TLJ that I watched????

 

[BatLobster]

LFL rejected Trevorrow and brought back Abrams on the condition of finding a way to get Ben Solo a hero moment against a bigger bad - so that wasn't Abrams's call, it was his charge from a bunch of Ben Solo fanboys in LFL, who had seen Trevorrow try to create a new villain for them in Sollony Ren, and had realized that wasn't going to work either.

Is that actually a fact? That's the very first I've heard of this. As far as I understood, the primary reason for Trevorrow's script being scrapped was Carrie Fisher's passing and Trevorrow being unable to course correct as she played a much bigger role in his script. If what you're saying is true, that's just new information to me. Regardless, Abrams still chose to come back, accept a generous salary and make that movie. It wouldn't absolve him of anything in my book, that's a fundamental and major story decision. If he disagreed with it, he could've simply not made the movie, he wasn't contractually obligated. He's a willing participant. I would think he would've held more bargaining chips in the situation being that they were down a writer/director and were fighting against the clock on a release date.

I know you loathe TLJ, that's fine, I'm not looking to relitigate the whole "who's to blame for ruining Star Wars" thing, because I've moved beyond trying to point the finger at a single director when it's crystal clear IMO that Disney/Iger, and their entire cynical handling of the whole situation, from the way George was pushed out, to rushing the release schedule with no solid game plan/justification for the story in place, is the root cause of what went wrong here. Iger even basically admitted it in his book. Anything beyond that is kind of semantics to me at this point.

Rewinding back to 2012...this was when we got the news of the Disney sale. This is what they led with, this was the promise. I remember being so excited when I saw this. Kathy is saying all the right things. George is still involved and shepherding the story.



Disney fell tragically short of all the intentions that were being expressed in this interview with the ST. George made the choice to sell, so that's on him, but he got done dirty and ultimately so did Star Wars.

 

[BatLobster]

The thing that is just hard for me to get over these days...as much as I honestly do think there ARE a lot of redeeming and worthwhile aspects to the ST that I can enjoy...

It's just, when you really break it down...if you think of all of Star Wars like this one big painting that took decades to paint. Of course, Lucas had a lot of collaborators, but he was the driving force and vision behind everything. It's his painting. And then, within the span of a few years, a bunch of other artists came in and said "here George, we'll finish it for ya", and just proceeded to paint all this stuff on top of it. Regardless of what you think of the result, that's just what happened. And I think that inevitably leads to a lot of problems at a fundamental level, if you're really trying to view the saga was one big cohesive story.

It's different to me than directors coming in and doing spin-off stories. The numbered saga was a very peculiar, layered cake, and it was George's baby. Adding a new ending onto a saga that had already ended is already tricky business, even if you ARE the original creator. Then you go and take the original creator out of the equation...it's just a huge risk and it's in a funky territory artistically right out of the gate.

One day I hope we really get the true, full, no punches pulled, behind the scenes story of what happened with this trilogy. It's obvious that Disney is very guarded about it with them canning the Making Of books. But when enough time has passed, I hope we can learn more. Regardless of the films themselves, I think it's gotta be a pretty fascinating story.

 

[SwordOfMorning]

The thing that is just hard for me to get over these days...as much as I honestly do think there ARE a lot of redeeming and worthwhile aspects to the ST that I can enjoy...

It's just, when you really break it down...if you think of all of Star Wars like this one big painting that took decades to paint. Of course, Lucas had a lot of collaborators, but he was the driving force and vision behind everything. It's his painting. And then, within the span of a few years, a bunch of other artists came in and said "here George, we'll finish it for ya", and just proceeded to paint all this stuff on top of it. Regardless of what you think of the result, that's just what happened. And I think that inevitably leads to a lot of problems at a fundamental level, if you're really trying to view the saga was one big cohesive story.

It's different to me than directors coming in and doing spin-off stories. The numbered saga was a very peculiar, layered cake, and it was George's baby. Adding a new ending onto a saga that had already ended is already tricky business, even if you ARE the original creator. Then you go and take the original creator out of the equation...it's just a huge risk and it's in a funky territory artistically right out of the gate.

One day I hope we really get the true, full, no punches pulled, behind the scenes story of what happened with this trilogy. It's obvious that Disney is very guarded about it with them canning the Making Of books. But when enough time has passed, I hope we can learn more. Regardless of the films themselves, I think it's gotta be a pretty fascinating story.

The OT is so collaborative that Lucas's attempts at exerting sole authorship over it have always bothered me, tbh, I am every bit as interested in Kasdan and Kershner's contributions as I am Lucas's and having Kasdan work on TFA is as good as Lucas being involved. It feels like him trying to be part of the Big Auteur Boys club with his pals, an attitude toward filmmaking I find narcissistic and loathsome. I have no issue with someone other than Lucas being the one to finish the story. Speaking broadly here, of course, the sequel trilogy has plenty of issues - like TFA, adore TLJ and viscerally loath TROS.

I like Lucas's weird stupid ideas a lot but I think he peaked right out the gate as an artist with THX and A New Hope (A New Hope being the best SW film in my opinion, to give George his due) then rapidly spiralled on an endless downward trajectory afterwards. Every time he failed to lean on more talented creatives was a massive disaster.

On some level though I do get it: Everything outside of the original trilogy is essentially fan fiction to me, even the stuff I love - in the case of Andor even more than the OT if I leave nostalgia out of the equation. Be it George's flailing exercise in narcissism for the prequels or Disney's gradual descent from a safe but intriguing relaunch into pure corporate sludge.

 

[henzINNIT]

I don't think "cowardice" fits their reasoning, and its sadly not that surprising of a move for LFL - they're the type of TLJ fans who favored the "This is an improvement over TFA because Ben Solo is promoted over Finn, Rey is made reliant on him for her meaning, and he's the Best Boy!" interpretation of that movie. Hell, they may have even inspired it, since Johnson's blatant favoritism for him might have come from or been encouraged by Lucasfilm emphasizing they thought Driver should be the male lead and not really caring about Rey.

Kylo getting the promotion to Supreme Leader is really the only thing from TLJ actually showing interest in him as a villain; the film is diametrically opposed to Rey having a personal conflict with him caused by his numerous atrocities upon her and her friends personally, and in general just wants him treated like a sympathetic angsty teenager instead of as a Neo-Nazi School Shooter and pseudo-#MeToo perpetrator. And again... EVERYONE at LFL was happy to have him usurp Finn's place as the male lead and make Rey dependent on him for her personal connection to the Saga.

If they figured that Kylo killing Han in cold blood, maiming Finn, torturing and then violating the mind of Rey, and just always being psychotic didn't matter, than why would they think that him telling Rey "no" to another redemption offer would mean anything?

They clearly wanted him as the real main character, and didn't have the standards to make that work well or recognize how bad of an idea that was.

This comes off as pretty.... nuts. There wasn't some sinister plot to steal Finn's screen-time and give it to Kylo. Kylo was the main villain and one of the most popular new characters. He was due his material. Finn was largely mishandled, starting all the way back to being used as a red herring in TFA to hide Rey in marketing. He deserved better. It doesn't mean one was sacrificed for the other.

 

[Gothamsknight]

Been thinking about the ST the last few days, probably due in part to the 6 year anniversary of TLJ and the 4 year anniversary of TROS. As much as I really do think the ST was a failure and a let down overall, I can't help but still feel like TLJ is a great movie and I still enjoy TFA. I don't know, I just can't bring myself to dowright hate everything in TFA and TLJ like the internet seems to love doing. Rey, and Kylo are both characters that I still love, despite the fact that I was incredibly let down by TROS. I truly truly believe if TROS had followed what Rian did with TLJ, the trilogy would have gone out on a high note. I stil firmly believe that a lot of fans grips with TLJ was the fact that Luke didn't get some over the top lightsaber action scene. Yes, I know that people had issues with his characterization, but let's be real, there's a lot of people who just love the spectacle of lightsaber fights and if Luke had a huge action scene and didn't die, people would probably be fine with his characterization. I'm still in the camp that thinks what Luke did at the end of TLJ was some of the most aw inspiring stuff to come out of a Star Wars flick.

with many Star Wars shows released, some great, and others forgettable, I can't help but feel like the magic is literally gone now. Yes, I thoroughly enjoyed Ashoka, but the spectacle of Star Wars is something I haven't felt since TLJ. Mandalorian was great at first, but even that show i feel like has run it's course now. I really believe Star Wars is stuck in a tug of war of the comfort and nostalgia of a certain era, while also wanting to try new things and it feels more like an indentity crisis at this point. It makes me wonder if the driving factor of Star Wars has more to do with childhood memories than anything else these days because at it stands it feels stuck.

That brings me to my next point. The biggest downfall of the ST in terms of cohesiveness is the obession with the OT and the fear of taking risks like the PT. With TFA it made sense, and then to have Rian come in and take it in a different direction actually made a lot of sense to me, but to then just pivot to a greatist hits collection with TROS, that still managed to feel too much like ROTJ at some points, and basically try to satisfy everybody including the reylos with that god awful kiss just made any sort of potentially satisfactory ending impossible.

The best things to come out of the ST was Daisy Ridley and Adam Driver. They are both cemented as part of the Star War family to me no matter how you feel about the movies. Boyega was done dirty.

 

[henzINNIT]

Been thinking about the ST the last few days, probably due in part to the 6 year anniversary of TLJ and the 4 year anniversary of TROS. As much as I really do think the ST was a failure and a let down overall, I can't help but still feel like TLJ is a great movie and I still enjoy TFA. I don't know, I just can't bring myself to dowright hate everything in TFA and TLJ like the internet seems to love doing. Rey, and Kylo are both characters that I still love, despite the fact that I was incredibly let down by TROS. I truly truly believe if TROS had followed what Rian did with TLJ, the trilogy would have gone out on a high note. I stil firmly believe that a lot of fans grips with TLJ was the fact that Luke didn't get some over the top lightsaber action scene. Yes, I know that people had issues with his characterization, but let's be real, there's a lot of people who just love the spectacle of lightsaber fights and if Luke had a huge action scene and didn't die, people would probably be fine with his characterization. I'm still in the camp that thinks what Luke did at the end of TLJ was some of the most aw inspiring stuff to come out of a Star Wars flick.

with many Star Wars shows released, some great, and others forgettable, I can't help but feel like the magic is literally gone now. Yes, I thoroughly enjoyed Ashoka, but the spectacle of Star Wars is something I haven't felt since TLJ. Mandalorian was great at first, but even that show i feel like has run it's course now. I really believe Star Wars is stuck in a tug of war of the comfort and nostalgia of a certain era, while also wanting to try new things and it feels more like an indentity crisis at this point. It makes me wonder if the driving factor of Star Wars has more to do with childhood memories than anything else these days because at it stands it feels stuck.

That brings me to my next point. The biggest downfall of the ST in terms of cohesiveness is the obession with the OT and the fear of taking risks like the PT. With TFA it made sense, and then to have Rian come in and take it in a different direction actually made a lot of sense to me, but to then just pivot to a greatist hits collection with TROS, that still managed to feel too much like ROTJ at some points, and basically try to satisfy everybody including the reylos with that god awful kiss just made any sort of potentially satisfactory ending impossible.

The best things to come out of the ST was Daisy Ridley and Adam Driver. They are both cemented as part of the Star War family to me no matter how you feel about the movies. Boyega was done dirty.

Pretty much agreed on all of this. I can't regard the ST as a success overall, but I still like TFA and particularly TLJ a lot. With a solid third part this could have been a respectable trilogy. TROS to me is basically everything people who hate TLJ said about that movie. I'm not mad about it, just disappointed (ha).

I liked the initial pitch that Disney had, where all these SW projects would be director driven and unique, and it is remarkable how quickly that all fell apart. For me, the magic was gone as soon as it became apparent that creatives weren't thriving and a release schedule took priority over making a film that could stand next to the originals.

Andor was pretty damn good for the most part though. Fair play.

 

[BatLobster]

My thing with the ST is, I can enjoy the films individually on their own merits (with TROS that gets a lot harder haha), but these days when I zoom out any further than that, I have a much harder time viewing them as an authentic, vital part of Star Wars mythology vs. well-produced fan fiction with some meta commentary on Star Wars. Ultimately they made Episode 7 without having a fundamental reason about why the saga and story of the Skywalkers should continue beyond Return of the Jedi. Other than the fact that George Lucas sold the rights and the original cast had already agreed to return. No matter how breezy and entertaining TFA is, it's hard to get around that shaky foundation. Maybe The Force Awakens was a leap of faith that everything would sort itself out, but Disney's relentless release schedule made that a lot more difficult. But hey, I mean I'll probably be watching The Force Awakens for the rest of my life as it's my wife's second favorite Star Wars. I love that it makes her happy. I can enjoy it on its own, but I've just had to accept that there are big decisions in it I will never agree with, decisions that had a massive impact on the trajectory of the whole sequel trilogy. And the potential of ideas that never really pay off or get developed enough becomes very bittersweet now.

At this point, I'm just hopeful that they can rectify things with future stories, and maybe Filoni can help fill in the gaps enough to open the door for better stories in the future about the Jedi. Ultimately, we were waiting 30 years for a payoff to Luke being tasked with restoring the Jedi order, and it still hasn't really happened. The sequels ended up telling a mostly redundant story that kicked the can down the road. But, there still could be a chance to tell a worthwhile story about the New Jedi Order, so I'm hoping for the best with this Rey movie.

The OT is so collaborative that Lucas's attempts at exerting sole authorship over it have always bothered me, tbh, I am every bit as interested in Kasdan and Kershner's contributions as I am Lucas's and having Kasdan work on TFA is as good as Lucas being involved. It feels like him trying to be part of the Big Auteur Boys club with his pals, an attitude toward filmmaking I find narcissistic and loathsome. I have no issue with someone other than Lucas being the one to finish the story. Speaking broadly here, of course, the sequel trilogy has plenty of issues - like TFA, adore TLJ and viscerally loath TROS.

I like Lucas's weird stupid ideas a lot but I think he peaked right out the gate as an artist with THX and A New Hope (A New Hope being the best SW film in my opinion, to give George his due) then rapidly spiralled on an endless downward trajectory afterwards. Every time he failed to lean on more talented creatives was a massive disaster.

On some level though I do get it: Everything outside of the original trilogy is essentially fan fiction to me, even the stuff I love - in the case of Andor even more than the OT if I leave nostalgia out of the equation. Be it George's flailing exercise in narcissism for the prequels or Disney's gradual descent from a safe but intriguing relaunch into pure corporate sludge.

I have to disagree with a lot of this. When I think of almost any of my favorite filmmakers, it’s not too surprising that it’s always the ones who have a distinctive voice and point of view that immediately spring to mind. And I’m guessing that would often be the case for anyone who consider themselves a film fan. Film is of course a collaborative medium, but that is also not mutually exclusive with a filmmaker having a voice that comes through in all of their work. It’s true in both the OT and the PT. Call it auteur or not, but I mean…we’re talking about creative voice/vision here. Lucas obviously had one. There is a nuanced, cinematic language and eclectic array of influences at play in all 6 of the original films. And Star Wars is that much richer for it. Beyond that, regardless of what one thinks of the prequels as films, Lucas absolutely had a worthwhile, coherent story and substantial themes he aimed to explore with those films, not to mention all the impressive world-building he did...something I consider quite important for space fantasy. That all counts for so much in my book.

The sequels are more conventional, better directed/acted films than the prequels, sure. They’re more functional as ‘traditional’ blockbusters and throwbacks (particularly JJ‘s) to the OT. But man, the prequels are just infinitely more interesting to me with just a lot more going on under the surface. Strictly as a piece of Star Wars mythology, Phantom Menace > Force Awakens, by a country mile for me. The thing is, whether you want to call it a success, a failure or something in between….you can praise or blame George. It’s his success, or his failure. He can own that, because it’s his vision, his experiment if you will. As a fan of both filmmaking and the mythology of Star Wars, I find a lot of value in that. I will take George Lucas’ “failure” over Bob Iger’s every day of the week.

I really recommend anyone who watched the RLM Plinkett reviews and was persuaded by them (like I was at one point) give this an honest watch and entertain an opposing perspective.



I think this video does an incredible job highlighting the merits of and making clear Lucas’ vision, how underestimated he often is as an artist, and how poor those Plinkett reviews actually are from a pure film criticism standpoint, as entertaining as they may me. It’s a long watch (feature film length lol), but it’s very compelling, well-researched and well-argued IMO.

Ultimately, the issue I have is...if someone hates the prequels. Fine, that's cool. I think the prequels are often misunderstood, but it's still possible for someone to take a deep dive, gain an understanding of what Lucas was aiming for, and still dislike them or consider them failures. But you can at least actually have somewhat of a coherent discussion about it. Ideas vs. execution, etc. With the sequels, seemingly everyone is one the same page about disliking them now but it's often for totally diverging reasons. The discourse around them is confused and chaotic, because that's kind of what the movies themselves were. And I think that's what happens when you have a corporate-driven product with too many cooks in the kitchen and no creative north star.

 

[SwordOfMorning]

My thing with the ST is, I can enjoy the films individually on their own merits (with TROS that gets a lot harder haha), but these days when I zoom out any further than that, I have a much harder time viewing them as an authentic, vital part of Star Wars mythology vs. well-produced fan fiction with some meta commentary on Star Wars. Ultimately they made Episode 7 without having a fundamental reason about why the saga and story of the Skywalkers should continue beyond Return of the Jedi. Other than the fact that George Lucas sold the rights and the original cast had already agreed to return. No matter how breezy and entertaining TFA is, it's hard to get around that shaky foundation. Maybe The Force Awakens was a leap of faith that everything would sort itself out, but Disney's relentless release schedule made that a lot more difficult. But hey, I mean I'll probably be watching The Force Awakens for the rest of my life as it's my wife's second favorite Star Wars. I love that it makes her happy. I can enjoy it on its own, but I've just had to accept that there are big decisions in it I will never agree with, decisions that had a massive impact on the trajectory of the whole sequel trilogy. And the potential of ideas that never really pay off or get developed enough becomes very bittersweet now.

At this point, I'm just hopeful that they can rectify things with future stories, and maybe Filoni can help fill in the gaps enough to open the door for better stories in the future about the Jedi. Ultimately, we were waiting 30 years for a payoff to Luke being tasked with restoring the Jedi order, and it still hasn't really happened. The sequels ended up telling a mostly redundant story that kicked the can down the road. But, there still could be a chance to tell a worthwhile story about the New Jedi Order, so I'm hoping for the best with this Rey movie.

Mixed feelings on this. The rush to make absurdly tight release windows is a huge part of what prevented the sequel trilogy of living up to their potential, on that we agree.

But here's the thing: the story the sequels tell, while also too repetitive of the OT status quo (something TLJ tries very hard to break out of in the ways that actually matter), are a lot more interesting than the story of Luke "rebuilding" the Jedi order. At least from a character perspective. That is a concept I don't care about at all, what I do find interesting however is the idea of that whole project ultimately being a massive failure. The idea that the better world the original trio tried to build, along with their personal lives, completely collapsing is super dramatically compelling to me. Obviously, like everything else in the ST it is executed rather messily- a perfect example would be that I love the idea of Han just totally regressing and ****ing off after his son pulls space Columbine, running around in a sad imitation of his scoundrel era to avoid dealing with the dissolution of his family. A concept that is certainly there in TFA but winds up playing more as an excuse to put classic Han back on the board.

TLJ, however, is a movie which while not without several flaws has a lot to say that is for the most part quite coherent about it. I'd argue that TLJ and to a considerably greater extent Andor both have more interesting things to say than Lucas ever has in his career.

I have to disagree with a lot of this. When I think of almost any of my favorite filmmakers, it’s not too surprising that it’s always the ones who have a distinctive voice and point of view that immediately spring to mind. And I’m guessing that would often be the case for anyone who consider themselves a film fan. Film is of course a collaborative medium, but that is also not mutually exclusive with a filmmaker having a voice that comes through in all of their work. It’s true in both the OT and the PT. Call it auteur or not, but I mean…we’re talking about creative voice/vision here. Lucas obviously had one. There is a nuanced, cinematic language and eclectic array of influences at play in all 6 of the original films. And Star Wars is that much richer for it. Beyond that, regardless of what one thinks of the prequels as films, Lucas absolutely had a worthwhile, coherent story and substantial themes he aimed to explore with those films, not to mention all the impressive world-building he did...something I consider quite important for space fantasy. That all counts for so much in my book.

The sequels are more conventional, better directed/acted films than the prequels, sure. They’re more functional as ‘traditional’ blockbusters and throwbacks (particularly JJ‘s) to the OT. But man, the prequels are just infinitely more interesting to me with just a lot more going on under the surface. Strictly as a piece of Star Wars mythology, Phantom Menace > Force Awakens, by a country mile for me. The thing is, whether you want to call it a success, a failure or something in between….you can praise or blame George. It’s his success, or his failure. He can own that, because it’s his vision, his experiment if you will. As a fan of both filmmaking and the mythology of Star Wars, I find a lot of value in that. I will take George Lucas’ “failure” over Bob Iger’s every day of the week.

Yeah, where you see that I just see a lot of self-defeating ego. There's nothing all that interesting about the prequels to me, I find the political commentary to just be absurd surface goofy boomer stuff. The only one of Lucas's unpopular prequel concepts I like is his version of Anakin because Lucas's conception of Darth Vader as an utterly miserable, kind of pathetic figure is great. It's also one aspect of Lucas's work I think the better parts of the sequel trilogy retroactively make better with the obvious throughline of Hayden's Anakin to Kylo Ren. I also totally reject that they have a lot more going on under the surface than at the very least The Last Jedi, I think TLJ is the most coherently about stuff out of any Star Wars movie.

It all coming down to George, while obviously better than it all coming down to a creatively bankrupt sociopath like Bob Iger, isn't really a benefit to me. Star Wars was collaborative from day one, the best SW film (Empire, despite my own ANH preference) is the one Lucas had the least involvement in and feels obvious resentment towards because of it, obvious Lucas was the creative north star but that was the role in which he shined. Trying to repaint himself as a singular creative rather than outsourcing his ideas to collaborators isn't admirable or visionary to me, it's just kinda depressing. Imagine how much better the prequels would be with Lucas's ideas being executed by a better director (which to be fair he tried to make happen during Phantom Menace) or someone with actual writing talent, just look at the insane difference Tom Stoppard ghostwriting parts of Revenge of the Sith made - it becomes a totally different movie when people are speaking coherent, well written dialogue. I find Lucas very interesting as a director, I even really like his pre-Star Wars movies, but ultimately his story is one of being an incredibly self-defeating and insecure artist.

I also don't actually think Star Wars is all that interesting to begin with in terms of world building outside of the aesthetics. It's not something I really go to SW for, the world of SW has always mostly just felt like a well-designed backdrop for the characters. Not something akin to Middle-Earth or Westeros.

I really recommend anyone who watched the RLM Plinkett reviews and was persuaded by them (like I was at one point) give this an honest watch and entertain an opposing perspective.



I think this video does an incredible job highlighting the merits of and making clear Lucas’ vision, how underestimated he often is as an artist, and how poor those Plinkett reviews actually are from a pure film criticism standpoint, as entertaining as they may me. It’s a long watch (feature film length lol), but it’s very compelling, well-researched and well-argued IMO.

Ultimately, the issue I have is...if someone hates the prequels. Fine, that's cool. I think the prequels are often misunderstood, but it's still possible for someone to take a deep dive, gain an understanding of what Lucas was aiming for, and still dislike them or consider them failures. But you can at least actually have somewhat of a coherent discussion about it. Ideas vs. execution, etc. With the sequels, seemingly everyone is one the same page about disliking them now but it's often for totally diverging reasons. The discourse around them is confused and chaotic, because that's kind of what the movies themselves were. And I think that's what happens when you have a corporate-driven product with too many cooks in the kitchen and no creative north star.

Know this isn't directed at me specifically but not a Plinkett fan to begin with. Love RLM but they have a huge, whiny old man blindspot regarding certain things and have ultimately contribued in a major way to some very toxic parts of nerd culture.

Eh, the ST has its fandom. It's just a lot younger. TROS being one of the most pathetic, cloying blockbuster movies ever made will always be a complete millstone for it though.

 

[C. Lee]

Thoughts.....

I think the biggest problem with STAR WARS fandom is....expectation (hope). It seems to me that fans have spent most of their time expecting the next STAR WARS movie or trilogy to be as great as the first one. And when they didn't meet the expectation, they spent their time tearing them down. The expectation that I had was....that I would be entertained. I never expected the next movie, or now TV series, to be great. I just expected (hoped) that they would be entertaining. Things can be entertaining without being great...they can be entertaining without being loved. I love some STAR WARS, I'm disappointed in parts of some others....but I have been entertained in some way by them all. And that's all an old man can hope for.

 

[BatLobster]

Mixed feelings on this. The rush to make absurdly tight release windows is a huge part of what prevented the sequel trilogy of living up to their potential, on that we agree.

But here's the thing: the story the sequels tell, while also too repetitive of the OT status quo (something TLJ tries very hard to break out of in the ways that actually matter), are a lot more interesting than the story of Luke "rebuilding" the Jedi order. At least from a character perspective. That is a concept I don't care about at all, what I do find interesting however is the idea of that whole project ultimately being a massive failure. The idea that the better world the original trio tried to build, along with their personal lives, completely collapsing is super dramatically compelling to me. Obviously, like everything else in the ST it is executed rather messily- a perfect example would be that I love the idea of Han just totally regressing and ****ing off after his son pulls space Columbine, running around in a sad imitation of his scoundrel era to avoid dealing with the dissolution of his family. A concept that is certainly there in TFA but winds up playing more as an excuse to put classic Han back on the board.

TLJ, however, is a movie which while not without several flaws has a lot to say that is for the most part quite coherent about it. I'd argue that TLJ and to a considerably greater extent Andor both have more interesting things to say than Lucas ever has in his career.

Yeah, where you see that I just see a lot of self-defeating ego. There's nothing all that interesting about the prequels to me, I find the political commentary to just be absurd surface goofy boomer stuff. The only one of Lucas's unpopular prequel concepts I like is his version of Anakin because Lucas's conception of Darth Vader as an utterly miserable, kind of pathetic figure is great. It's also one aspect of Lucas's work I think the better parts of the sequel trilogy retroactively make better with the obvious throughline of Hayden's Anakin to Kylo Ren. I also totally reject that they have a lot more going on under the surface than at the very least The Last Jedi, I think TLJ is the most coherently about stuff out of any Star Wars movie.

It all coming down to George, while obviously better than it all coming down to a creatively bankrupt sociopath like Bob Iger, isn't really a benefit to me. Star Wars was collaborative from day one, the best SW film (Empire, despite my own ANH preference) is the one Lucas had the least involvement in and feels obvious resentment towards because of it, obvious Lucas was the creative north star but that was the role in which he shined. Trying to repaint himself as a singular creative rather than outsourcing his ideas to collaborators isn't admirable or visionary to me, it's just kinda depressing. Imagine how much better the prequels would be with Lucas's ideas being executed by a better director (which to be fair he tried to make happen during Phantom Menace) or someone with actual writing talent, just look at the insane difference Tom Stoppard ghostwriting parts of Revenge of the Sith made - it becomes a totally different movie when people are speaking coherent, well written dialogue. I find Lucas very interesting as a director, I even really like his pre-Star Wars movies, but ultimately his story is one of being an incredibly self-defeating and insecure artist.

I also don't actually think Star Wars is all that interesting to begin with in terms of world building outside of the aesthetics. It's not something I really go to SW for, the world of SW has always mostly just felt like a well-designed backdrop for the characters. Not something akin to Middle-Earth or Westeros.

Know this isn't directed at me specifically but not a Plinkett fan to begin with. Love RLM but they have a huge, whiny old man blindspot regarding certain things and have ultimately contribued in a major way to some very toxic parts of nerd culture.

Eh, the ST has its fandom. It's just a lot younger. TROS being one of the most pathetic, cloying blockbuster movies ever made will always be a complete millstone for it though.

A few things here--

-You're right, the Plinkett thing wasn't directed at you, but I still think that video is worth checking out for anyone interested in gaining a more well-rounded view of the prequels. I've always been more of a prequel defender myself, but I still found myself having a lot of "aha" moments with it and 'getting' Lucas' vision more than I already did. Star Wars is so much more than just another fantasy series to me, for me it really it's been window into everything from film history, to how movies are made, to world history, to mythology/spirituality. It's the cinematic melting pot of so much for me. I really do attribute that to the totality of what Lucas' vision for Star Wars is, even if sure, Kershner technically made the best-directed Star Wars movie. Or the fact that Marcia Lucas saved the original film in the edit. Every important collaborator should absolutely be recognized and celebrated for their contributions (John Williams is the most important one IMO), but so should the original artistic intent and ambition behind the whole thing, which came from Lucas.

-I'm certainly not saying Lucas' vision is perfect. In a "perfect" world, sure, we could've gotten Spielberg directing the prequels, Kasdan involved in the writing, with Lucas guiding everything. Would LOVE to peek into the alternate universe where those movies got made! But at the same time, the thing I really admire about the prequels is...I don't think a major studio, certainly not Disney, would've let someone make those movies as they are. I appreciate them, imperfections and all, because I just think they're just such a unique piece of film history. They were bold and risky in so many ways, and Lucas stood behind that risk completely by self-financing them and taking on the (probably too big) workload of writing and directing all of them. Lucas famously didn't love writing OR directing, and was always pretty self-deprecating about his abilities in both. I really just think he had a deep personal investment in telling that story in the way he felt it should be told. Love it or hate it, I personally have to respect it.

-I still think the prequels were collaborative, even if they are sometimes limited by Lucas' stilted directing style. You still had so many incredible artists doing amazing work on those movies. Not the least of which being John Williams who went extra hard on them. The designs and locations alone are incredible and so much more fresh and new than just about anything in the sequels.

-As far as the story treating the original trio as failures and the Jedi Order a failure....well, in theory, that could be a compelling story. But it's not a story the sequels were able to really tell, because it's already happened. It just kind of takes the ending of Return of the Jedi and goes..."nope!". TLJ has to try its hardest to reckon with this. I also am not saying I wanted to see the story of Luke rebuilding the order. But I think there could've/should've been a way to actually see what the New Republic actually is. How is it different than the old one? What is the role of the Jedi now? I think it's possible that a compelling story could've been constructed in a way where we as the audience aren't completely denied seeing some of the fruits of the victory that was so well-earned in the original trilogy. I think even The Matrix Resurrections does a much better job at handling that sort of thing.

-If you've noticed, I haven't really been talking about TLJ specifically in relation to my issues with the sequels trilogy as a whole. It's kind of on its own island to me. But whatever good ideas and big swings are in there, it can't single-handedly overcome everything that came before and after it. I look at it more as a minor miracle that Johnson was given the autonomy to work in his own bubble and make a movie that at least attempted to say something and tried to grapple with the Star Wars myth as a whole. Very crucially-- including the prequels. The idea of the Jedi Order being a failure whose blindness and arrogance led to its own downfall wasn't an original take that Johnson introduced, it was an idea that George Lucas had spent three films dealing with. Same goes for all the messaging in there about the war machine and both sides being bad. All prequel stuff, just stated more bluntly.

Johnson gets it:



So to me, even at its best, TLJ is still a film that is very clearly standing on the shoulders of what's come before, as hard as its trying to blaze a new path. Where The Force Awakens tried its hardest to pretend the prequels didn't exist, I found myself gravitating more to TLJ because I felt it shared a bit more of a spiritual connection to them, and is able to kind of distill their essence in a way that maybe gives them some added resonance. But at the same time, I still think it's caught in the uncomfortable position of being the middle act of a trilogy where it has to address (or in some cases sidestep) some major elephants in the room that TFA put in there. I really am not so sure that if Rian Johnson was writing Episode VII that he would've done the Luke is MIA story and given the trilogy the same foundation. So I'm kind of just left wondering what his ideal sequel trilogy might've been, if he was given the opportunity to be involved from Day 1. When you hear Johnson talk about his justification for Luke's character, so much of it comes seems to come down to the fact that he was trying to account for why Luke would not be there for Han. It's an unknowable, but yeah.

-I do wonder how the ST will age and how its generation of fans will regard it over time once they're able to get more analytical about them. Honestly, I hope some day to see some more compelling arguments in their favor. I'd be interested in that. I still look for things to appreciate if I ever watch them. I always want to find more reasons to love Star Wars. To be honest, I got so burnt out from the TLJ discourse and defending the movie, and then TROS was such a deeply frustrating movie to me that I so badly wanted to love...I just got disillusioned with the entire trilogy. And I just end up flashing back to all the red flags I had in my head when Disney bought the franchise that I put aside, hoping for the best. Seeing the release dates only 2 years apart but that there were no completed scripts at the time. JJ Abrams' hiring...mixed feelings, if I'm being honest. Learning as we got closer to TFA that Lucas had been pushed out and wasn't hiding that he was unhappy about the direction it was going. The idea that each movie was going to be a different director and writer. All of these things made me question if this trilogy was on solid ground creatively, but I really just bought in entirely and tried my best to embrace whatever these films were going to be. The trailers...my god the trailers...made it very easy to fall in love with the idea of what these movies could be, and let my guard down entirely.

- I do think TLJ might age the best of them, but again that doesn't account for the trilogy as a whole. Embracing the sequel trilogy as a whole requires embracing Disney's handling of it at the larger level. I feel like that is gonna be pretty tricky. It's one thing for someone to grow up and have nostalgia for them because it's what got them into Star Wars. If the movies did that for kids, great-- that alone is worth something. But I can do that for movies I liked as a kid, but I know are objectively not great. It's a different thing for someone to simply like them (which is fine, everyone is entitled to that) vs. arguing for the artistic merit of them. I think that's just an inherently harder proposition, when by the time we got to TROS it became very clear that the two directors of this trilogy were simply not on the same wavelength creatively. I really wanted to believe that wasn't true, but TROS just made it very clear. Even just stylistically alone...the difference between Abrams and Johnson is just kind of jarring.

Sorry for the rant...but this is kind of therapeutic for me haha. Part of the frustration I've had with the sequels is that the criticism and discourse around them became so toxic, which made it kind of hard to voice any criticism without feeling like I was feeding the beast. The quality of the films will never excuse the way some fans behaved. It was true in the prequel era and true today. But now that some time has passed and seemingly Disney is going to try to move forward with telling post-TROS stories, I find myself wanting to try to process all of this stuff more and have an honest discussion about it. I do love talking about Star Wars, even if I'm in disagreement with the other person, as long as it's casual and civil. Which can be next to impossible to find! So I appreciate the discussion, man.

 

[SwordOfMorning]

A few things here--

-You're right, the Plinkett thing wasn't directed at you, but I still think that video is worth checking out for anyone interested in gaining a more well-rounded view of the prequels. I've always been more of a prequel defender myself, but I still found myself having a lot of "aha" moments with it and 'getting' Lucas' vision more than I already did. Star Wars is so much more than just another fantasy series to me, for me it really it's been window into everything from film history, to how movies are made, to world history, to mythology/spirituality. It's the cinematic melting pot of so much for me. I really do attribute that to the totality of what Lucas' vision for Star Wars is, even if sure, Kershner technically made the best-directed Star Wars movie. Or the fact that Marcia Lucas saved the original film in the edit. Every important collaborator should absolutely be recognized and celebrated for their contributions (John Williams is the most important one IMO), but so should the original artistic intent and ambition behind the whole thing, which came from Lucas.

-I'm certainly not saying Lucas' vision is perfect. In a "perfect" world, sure, we could've gotten Spielberg directing the prequels, Kasdan involved in the writing, with Lucas guiding everything. Would LOVE to peek into the alternate universe where those movies got made! But at the same time, the thing I really admire about the prequels is...I don't think a major studio, certainly not Disney, would've let someone make those movies as they are. I appreciate them, imperfections and all, because I just think they're just such a unique piece of film history. They were bold and risky in so many ways, and Lucas stood behind that risk completely by self-financing them and taking on the (probably too big) workload of writing and directing all of them. Lucas famously didn't love writing OR directing, and was always pretty self-deprecating about his abilities in both. I really just think he had a deep personal investment in telling that story in the way he felt it should be told. Love it or hate it, I personally have to respect it.

-I still think the prequels were collaborative, even if they are sometimes limited by Lucas' stilted directing style. You still had so many incredible artists doing amazing work on those movies. Not the least of which being John Williams who went extra hard on them. The designs and locations alone are incredible and so much more fresh and new than just about anything in the sequels.

-As far as the story treating the original trio as failures and the Jedi Order a failure....well, in theory, that could be a compelling story. But it's not a story the sequels were able to really tell, because it's already happened. It just kind of takes the ending of Return of the Jedi and goes..."nope!". TLJ has to try its hardest to reckon with this. I also am not saying I wanted to see the story of Luke rebuilding the order. But I think there could've/should've been a way to actually see what the New Republic actually is. How is it different than the old one? What is the role of the Jedi now? I think it's possible that a compelling story could've been constructed in a way where we as the audience aren't completely denied seeing some of the fruits of the victory that was so well-earned in the original trilogy. I think even The Matrix Resurrections does a much better job at handling that sort of thing.

-If you've noticed, I haven't really been talking about TLJ specifically in relation to my issues with the sequels trilogy as a whole. It's kind of on its own island to me. But whatever good ideas and big swings are in there, it can't single-handedly overcome everything that came before and after it. I look at it more as a minor miracle that Johnson was given the autonomy to work in his own bubble and make a movie that at least attempted to say something and tried to grapple with the Star Wars myth as a whole. Very crucially-- including the prequels. The idea of the Jedi Order being a failure whose blindness and arrogance led to its own downfall wasn't an original take that Johnson introduced, it was an idea that George Lucas had spent three films dealing with. Same goes for all the messaging in there about the war machine and both sides being bad. All prequel stuff, just stated more bluntly.

Johnson gets it:



So to me, even at its best, TLJ is still a film that is very clearly standing on the shoulders of what's come before, as hard as its trying to blaze a new path. Where The Force Awakens tried its hardest to pretend the prequels didn't exist, I found myself gravitating more to TLJ because I felt it shared a bit more of a spiritual connection to them, and is able to kind of distill their essence in a way that maybe gives them some added resonance. But at the same time, I still think it's caught in the uncomfortable position of being the middle act of a trilogy where it has to address (or in some cases sidestep) some major elephants in the room that TFA put in there. I really am not so sure that if Rian Johnson was writing Episode VII that he would've done the Luke is MIA story and given the trilogy the same foundation. So I'm kind of just left wondering what his ideal sequel trilogy might've been, if he was given the opportunity to be involved from Day 1. When you hear Johnson talk about his justification for Luke's character, so much of it comes seems to come down to the fact that he was trying to account for why Luke would not be there for Han. It's an unknowable, but yeah.

-I do wonder how the ST will age and how its generation of fans will regard it over time once they're able to get more analytical about them. Honestly, I hope some day to see some more compelling arguments in their favor. I'd be interested in that. I still look for things to appreciate if I ever watch them. I always want to find more reasons to love Star Wars. To be honest, I got so burnt out from the TLJ discourse and defending the movie, and then TROS was such a deeply frustrating movie to me that I so badly wanted to love...I just got disillusioned with the entire trilogy. And I just end up flashing back to all the red flags I had in my head when Disney bought the franchise that I put aside, hoping for the best. Seeing the release dates only 2 years apart but that there were no completed scripts at the time. JJ Abrams' hiring...mixed feelings, if I'm being honest. Learning as we got closer to TFA that Lucas had been pushed out and wasn't hiding that he was unhappy about the direction it was going. The idea that each movie was going to be a different director and writer. All of these things made me question if this trilogy was on solid ground creatively, but I really just bought in entirely and tried my best to embrace whatever these films were going to be. The trailers...my god the trailers...made it very easy to fall in love with the idea of what these movies could be, and let my guard down entirely.

- I do think TLJ might age the best of them, but again that doesn't account for the trilogy as a whole. Embracing the sequel trilogy as a whole requires embracing Disney's handling of it at the larger level. I feel like that is gonna be pretty tricky. It's one thing for someone to grow up and have nostalgia for them because it's what got them into Star Wars. If the movies did that for kids, great-- that alone is worth something. But I can do that for movies I liked as a kid, but I know are objectively not great. It's a different thing for someone to simply like them (which is fine, everyone is entitled to that) vs. arguing for the artistic merit of them. I think that's just an inherently harder proposition, when by the time we got to TROS it became very clear that the two directors of this trilogy were simply not on the same wavelength creatively. I really wanted to believe that wasn't true, but TROS just made it very clear. Even just stylistically alone...the difference between Abrams and Johnson is just kind of jarring.

Sorry for the rant...but this is kind of therapeutic for me haha. Part of the frustration I've had with the sequels is that the criticism and discourse around them became so toxic, which made it kind of hard to voice any criticism without feeling like I was feeding the beast. The quality of the films will never excuse the way how some fans behaved. It was true in the prequel era and true today. But now that some time has passed and seemingly Disney is going to try to move forward with telling post-TROS stories, I find myself wanting to try to process all of this stuff more and have an honest discussion about it. I do love talking about Star Wars, even if I'm in disagreement with the other person, as long as it's casual and civil. Which can be next to impossible to find! So I appreciate the discussion, man.

We're on the same page about a lot of things, tbh, despite obvious differences in tastes. The sequel trilogy is absolutely not a coherent story, for as different as TFA and TLJ are any chance of that was really lost with TROS in its attempt at resetting back to TFA to such an extent that it ignored Abram's own interesting ideas that were ultimately of a piece with Johnson's (namely Kylo's arc being a reverse of Vader's). This isn't something that would bother me if each individual movie was good, if it was three different filmmakers Yes Anding each other with their own styles as was initially the idea it would have been better served - you know a film series is in trouble when people feel robbed of a ****ing Colin Trevorrow finale. Duel of the Fates wasn't a particularly good script, but it was a script that felt like a sequel to both TFA and TLJ whereas TROS feels actively ashamed of both movies.

Speaking of Yes Anding: You are entirely correct, TLJ is very engaged with the prequels. I really like that about it, I enjoy when a story engages with something that IMO didn't work and draws value of it. Ultimately enriching both. I hate the current milking of prequel nostalgia by Disney, both because I have not seen and have zero interest in the animated stuff the entire modern Star Wars franchise revolves around and also because it is somehow gives off the stench of an even more low-effort cynicism than their initial efforts to erase them from popular memory, but the moments when the ST actually engages with their ideas are some of the best parts. Hayden's Anakin might be an awful performance despite Hayden having a really unique screen presence a better director could have utilized well is still fascinating to me, I actually love that he's sort of a bad person from minute one, is only enriched by the way his failings will be echoed by his Grandson - it contributes to the undercurrent of familial tragedy I always sense TFA especially wants to engage with more than it ultimately does.

So, when it comes to the difference between Abrams and Johnson stylistically (and Abrams coming back to helm TROS was a huge mistake under the best circumstances, it needed to be a third voice) it is very noteworthy but when it comes down to TROS I have a really hard time blaming Abrams entirely. As previously mentioned, we know his intention for the story was for Kylo Ren to remain an antagonist throughout and a lot of the ST's most provocative, compelling ideas are all baked into that character and there was absolutely no way Disney was going to allow that by TROS. Hell, I'm not even sure how they brought Palpatine back was Abram's choice - we all know Matt Smith was going to be the big bad (presumably a cloned younger Palpatine?) in TROS originally, there was so much smoke around that and Smith himself has more or less confirmed it.

It's probably easier from my perspective because Star Wars is something that doesn't mean all that much to me, so I can be a lot more go with the flow about it (not a jab in anyway, I am exactly like you are with SW regarding a bunch of other franchises). Never the less, even I find the state of it is so depressing: it'll never feel special again, just endless grist for the content mill in a way that feels like every crummy EU (Zero nostalgia for the old EU from me, as a sidebar, never liked any of that stuff) book was plastered up on screen to be half watched in the background. There was a real chance with the ST, a real spark in both TFA and TLJ, that could have made for something really special. Those characters and those actors deserved so much more than they ultimately got.

Totally feel you. Star Wars is incredibly interesting but it is a subject I normally entirely avoid on the internet. Not an uncommon story, but I am one of those people who walked out of TLJ thinking it was gonna be a Dark Knight style universally beloved Thing and was all hyped to talk about it with people. That, uhhh, did not last long.

 

[Spider-Fan]

I have never been a PT fan, so I liked TFA (though has aged badly for me in many respects)and TLJ (which is a film I loved) more than those films. But TROS is garbage. Truth be told, Star Wars has been meh to me more than it has been good in the Disney era, so I have sort of checked out of it to a large extent. Blahsoka was the last straw for me. It wasn't actively abysmal. It was just sooooooo boring! I have never been so bored watching a limited series in my life.

 

[Sian]

This comes off as pretty.... nuts. There wasn't some sinister plot to steal Finn's screen-time and give it to Kylo. Kylo was the main villain and one of the most popular new characters. He was due his material. Finn was largely mishandled, starting all the way back to being used as a red herring in TFA to hide Rey in marketing. He deserved better. It doesn't mean one was sacrificed for the other.

Can I just say something here?
I have the TFA artbook and Finn was conceived as a supporting character right from the very beginning.
Originally he was called 'Sam', was meant to be a smuggler and was always going to be Rey's 'sidekick'. One of the names brought up when it came to casting was Tom Hollander.
It was Kasdan who came up with the idea that he was a former stormtrooper, but he was never meant to be 'male lead' - and since Adam Driver's recent revelation that he was originally never meant to be 'redeemed' it's pretty fair to say there was no male lead. Rey was the 'sole lead'. She was not just chief protagonist, she was 'the' protagonist. and Kylo was 'antagonist.'
The idea of a stormtrooper 'turning good' was a great one, but they never truly followed it through. Finn was 'jokey' because his origins were changed, but not his personality - thus a supposedly brainwashed child soldier acted like a comedy sidekick. Despite its dislike by gamers, the recent Halo tv series did a far better job at depicting what life was like for a child kidnapped and brainwashed into being an emotionless killer.
Anyone who doubts this can just look at TROS. The entire film was Disney hammering home that it was REY who was the most important character and everyone else background noise. Poe, Finn, and also Kylo, all played second fiddle to her. Finn's role was to worship her. Poe's to praise her. Kylo's to stand back and let her have the glory of killing the 'big bad' without ANYONE's help.
If anyone feels Finn was 'pushed aside' it wasn't because of Kylo Ren. It was because of Rey. And. to a lesser extent
Poe, who was supposed to be 'killed off' in TFA but survived because both Isaac and Abrams wanted him to.

 

[Sian]

We're on the same page about a lot of things, tbh, despite obvious differences in tastes. The sequel trilogy is absolutely not a coherent story, for as different as TFA and TLJ are any chance of that was really lost with TROS in its attempt at resetting back to TFA to such an extent that it ignored Abram's own interesting ideas that were ultimately of a piece with Johnson's (namely Kylo's arc being a reverse of Vader's). This isn't something that would bother me if each individual movie was good, if it was three different filmmakers Yes Anding each other with their own styles as was initially the idea it would have been better served - you know a film series is in trouble when people feel robbed of a ****ing Colin Trevorrow finale. Duel of the Fates wasn't a particularly good script, but it was a script that felt like a sequel to both TFA and TLJ whereas TROS feels actively ashamed of both movies.

Speaking of Yes Anding: You are entirely correct, TLJ is very engaged with the prequels. I really like that about it, I enjoy when a story engages with something that IMO didn't work and draws value of it. Ultimately enriching both. I hate the current milking of prequel nostalgia by Disney, both because I have not seen and have zero interest in the animated stuff the entire modern Star Wars franchise revolves around and also because it is somehow gives off the stench of an even more low-effort cynicism than their initial efforts to erase them from popular memory, but the moments when the ST actually engages with their ideas are some of the best parts. Hayden's Anakin might be an awful performance despite Hayden having a really unique screen presence a better director could have utilized well is still fascinating to me, I actually love that he's sort of a bad person from minute one, is only enriched by the way his failings will be echoed by his Grandson - it contributes to the undercurrent of familial tragedy I always sense TFA especially wants to engage with more than it ultimately does.

So, when it comes to the difference between Abrams and Johnson stylistically (and Abrams coming back to helm TROS was a huge mistake under the best circumstances, it needed to be a third voice) it is very noteworthy but when it comes down to TROS I have a really hard time blaming Abrams entirely. As previously mentioned, we know his intention for the story was for Kylo Ren to remain an antagonist throughout and a lot of the ST's most provocative, compelling ideas are all baked into that character and there was absolutely no way Disney was going to allow that by TROS. Hell, I'm not even sure how they brought Palpatine back was Abram's choice - we all know Matt Smith was going to be the big bad (presumably a cloned younger Palpatine?) in TROS originally, there was so much smoke around that and Smith himself has more or less confirmed it.

It's probably easier from my perspective because Star Wars is something that doesn't mean all that much to me, so I can be a lot more go with the flow about it (not a jab in anyway, I am exactly like you are with SW regarding a bunch of other franchises). Never the less, even I find the state of it is so depressing: it'll never feel special again, just endless grist for the content mill in a way that feels like every crummy EU (Zero nostalgia for the old EU from me, as a sidebar, never liked any of that stuff) book was plastered up on screen to be half watched in the background. There was a real chance with the ST, a real spark in both TFA and TLJ, that could have made for something really special. Those characters and those actors deserved so much more than they ultimately got.

Totally feel you. Star Wars is incredibly interesting but it is a subject I normally entirely avoid on the internet. Not an uncommon story, but I am one of those people who walked out of TLJ thinking it was gonna be a Dark Knight style universally beloved Thing and was all hyped to talk about it with people. That, uhhh, did not last long.

I know exactly how you feel.

 

[BatLobster]

We're on the same page about a lot of things, tbh, despite obvious differences in tastes. The sequel trilogy is absolutely not a coherent story, for as different as TFA and TLJ are any chance of that was really lost with TROS in its attempt at resetting back to TFA to such an extent that it ignored Abram's own interesting ideas that were ultimately of a piece with Johnson's (namely Kylo's arc being a reverse of Vader's). This isn't something that would bother me if each individual movie was good, if it was three different filmmakers Yes Anding each other with their own styles as was initially the idea it would have been better served - you know a film series is in trouble when people feel robbed of a ****ing Colin Trevorrow finale. Duel of the Fates wasn't a particularly good script, but it was a script that felt like a sequel to both TFA and TLJ whereas TROS feels actively ashamed of both movies.

Speaking of Yes Anding: You are entirely correct, TLJ is very engaged with the prequels. I really like that about it, I enjoy when a story engages with something that IMO didn't work and draws value of it. Ultimately enriching both. I hate the current milking of prequel nostalgia by Disney, both because I have not seen and have zero interest in the animated stuff the entire modern Star Wars franchise revolves around and also because it is somehow gives off the stench of an even more low-effort cynicism than their initial efforts to erase them from popular memory, but the moments when the ST actually engages with their ideas are some of the best parts. Hayden's Anakin might be an awful performance despite Hayden having a really unique screen presence a better director could have utilized well is still fascinating to me, I actually love that he's sort of a bad person from minute one, is only enriched by the way his failings will be echoed by his Grandson - it contributes to the undercurrent of familial tragedy I always sense TFA especially wants to engage with more than it ultimately does.

So, when it comes to the difference between Abrams and Johnson stylistically (and Abrams coming back to helm TROS was a huge mistake under the best circumstances, it needed to be a third voice) it is very noteworthy but when it comes down to TROS I have a really hard time blaming Abrams entirely. As previously mentioned, we know his intention for the story was for Kylo Ren to remain an antagonist throughout and a lot of the ST's most provocative, compelling ideas are all baked into that character and there was absolutely no way Disney was going to allow that by TROS. Hell, I'm not even sure how they brought Palpatine back was Abram's choice - we all know Matt Smith was going to be the big bad (presumably a cloned younger Palpatine?) in TROS originally, there was so much smoke around that and Smith himself has more or less confirmed it.

It's probably easier from my perspective because Star Wars is something that doesn't mean all that much to me, so I can be a lot more go with the flow about it (not a jab in anyway, I am exactly like you are with SW regarding a bunch of other franchises). Never the less, even I find the state of it is so depressing: it'll never feel special again, just endless grist for the content mill in a way that feels like every crummy EU (Zero nostalgia for the old EU from me, as a sidebar, never liked any of that stuff) book was plastered up on screen to be half watched in the background. There was a real chance with the ST, a real spark in both TFA and TLJ, that could have made for something really special. Those characters and those actors deserved so much more than they ultimately got.

Totally feel you. Star Wars is incredibly interesting but it is a subject I normally entirely avoid on the internet. Not an uncommon story, but I am one of those people who walked out of TLJ thinking it was gonna be a Dark Knight style universally beloved Thing and was all hyped to talk about it with people. That, uhhh, did not last long.

Great talk-- what do you know, two people can discuss Star Wars on the internet and come away with a better understanding of one another's views. Imagine that! :wink:

Not to drop another long video in here haha, but I also just recently found this one too:

It's a pretty thorough and well-researched account of how TROS came to be, from Trevorrow's script to early versions of TROS' script to how that story got very shuffled around in the final product. It sources some info from the Art of TROS book that was actually new to me that I can sum up here--

- Apparently, the Lucasfilm Intellectual Property Development Group-- not to be confused with the Lucasfilm Story Group, had a meeting in 2014 about a week after TFA began shooting. Pablo Hidalgo and Dave Filoni were part of that group, everyone else involved had no prior experience ever writing for Star Wars. Among the things discussed in that meeting were ideas like:

-Rey wouldn't be a biological Skywalker by birth, but would be adopted by the family by the end of the trilogy become one mythologically.

-Leia would be instrumental in the redemption of Kylo Ren and be a mentor to Rey.

-Kathleen Kennedy was keen on having a final villain that would tie the whole saga together.

I guess what's a bit unclear in all of this is where the influence of the Lucasfilm IPDG ends and the influence of the filmmakers begins. But ultimately all of this stuff is reflected in the final films in one way or another. This does seem to back up the idea that the redemption of Ben Solo was always being eyed from the beginning, which is relatively new information to me. The death of Carrie Fisher was obviously a very huge blow to the whole trilogy, as her having a more important role in Episode IX seems like one of the few things everyone was aligned on in terms of the plans for the trilogy.

That said, I still personally have come to believe that a lot of the issues with the trilogy stem from a shaky foundation that was laid with The Force Awakens. That movie's story was told in such a deliberately vague way- due in part to Abrams' 'mystery box' sensibilities and in part due to a rushed development after Lucas/Michael Arndt's work was scrapped. With no creative figurehead in place, it just left a lot of room for many diverging interpretations of where the story would go. The decision to make Luke MIA in The Force Awakens seemed to stem more from an inability to figure out what to do with him without overshadowing the new characters (based on what Abrams has said) vs. organically trying to figure out where Luke would be 30 years after we last saw him. I think there are a lot of things in the ST that suffer for similar reasons. Because The Force Awakens is full of plot points and characters that raise questions. Not just questions about where things are going, but questions about how things got to where they are too. And the rest of the trilogy has to play catch up in order to attempt to justify its existence as a post-ROTJ story, which finally comes to a head quite awkwardly with TROS.

The way I look at it, quite simply...Episode III tees up Episode IV. It jumps 20 years, and A New Hope is the start of a new story, but broadly speaking, if you're watching the movies in order you can understand that it's a continuation of the same story, and it makes sense minus some minor inconsistencies. That's just not the case when you go from Episode VI to Episode VII. There is a pretty jarring disconnect there, and it's done in a way that's intentional, but IMO if you're going to continue a beloved series that was wrapped up in a satisfying bow, there needed to be a lot more care taken with how you progress the narrative from the previous ending that had stood for 30 years.

 

[Sian]

I'm just sad they killed off all of the Skywalkers.
I hoped there would be a happy ending for them.

 

[Snow Queen]

We're not going to be posting The Post Millennial on here. You want to link right wing rags, do it somewhere else. And a Post Millennial article quoting Daily Wire? A real who's who of people not to post.

 

[Sian]

I was unaware the site was 'right wing'; in any case the lady herself was seen on camera making her comments about 'making men uncomfortable' - i myself found it disturbing as imagine if she had been a man talking about women.