The Last Jedi Luke Skywalker's role in "The Last Jedi": Did you like it?

[Mjölnir]

I'm agreeing with you.

 

[Webhead38]

From what I have seen in the SW films....and what Obi-Wan even says in ESB.....people tell "versions" of the truth at different times. Saying that something is the absolute truth because it was said in one of the movies....can be changed in the next movie when a new absolute truth is told.

I was never a big fan of that rationale to switch course in those stories. I don't remember anyone buying it when Obi Wan essentially justified lying to Luke about his dad by suggesting it was okay "from a certain point of view." No that was just bad writing.

It was even worse with Leia and laying one on Luke not once but twice, only to later say she 'somehow always knew' he was her brother. Huh?!! That certainly doesn't explain her desire to swap spit with him. Star Wars is full of character issues as Lucas changed course in the story. I'm afraid that is a legacy Last Jedi firmly adheres to. But I wouldn't call it character consistency as much as just poor execution. The original series had those issues. This one certainly does as well.

 

[MessiahDecoy123]

It's not impossible for Jedi Master Luke to kill Snoke, so the question becomes what I wrote above: "if you were powerful enough to possibly stop Hitler when he had risen to power, would you try to in order to save millions of lives?".

It's not an entirely given answer for most of us to risk our lives. It's a bit of an easier answer if you're the biggest hero of your galaxy.

Yeah the biggest hero tales out the biggest villain.

How many times should we play out this predictable trope in movies?

Also, Luke is not the ideal Jedi. I'd say Obi Wan and Yoda were both more wiser and more benevolent.

It makes sense that he would be naive to think he could rebuild the jedi order better than before without repeating the same mistakes. He has no where the amount of training and experience as past jedi masters.

It makes sense he would be tempted to kill his evil nephew since he almost killed Vader in a moment of rage. (I doubt Yoda or Obi Wan would've lost themselves in anger like that)

It also makes sense he would retire after seeing the jedi order fall twice through his father and nephew.

That's more than most jedi have personally witnessed.

 

[InCali]

From what I have seen in the SW films....and what Obi-Wan even says in ESB.....people tell "versions" of the truth at different times. Saying that something is the absolute truth because it was said in one of the movies....can be changed in the next movie when a new absolute truth is told.

I'm not convinced we saw what really happened between Kylo and Luke and I'm not convinced Kylo is being as honest with Rey as Vader was with Luke. In fact, I'm pretty sure he isn't.

 

[C. Lee]

I was never a big fan of that rationale to switch course in those stories. I don't remember anyone buying it when Obi Wan essentially justified lying to Luke about his dad by suggesting it was okay "from a certain point of view." No that was just bad writing.

It was even worse with Leia and laying one on Luke not once but twice, only to later say she 'somehow always knew' he was her brother. Huh?!! That certainly doesn't explain her desire to swap spit with him. Star Wars is full of character issues as Lucas changed course in the story. I'm afraid that is a legacy Last Jedi firmly adheres to. But I wouldn't call it character consistency as much as just poor execution. The original series had those issues. This one certainly does as well.

My point being....I see a lot of people post on here....it was shown in the movie so it is fact....when all the other movies have shown - it was shown in the movie so it is fact until it is changed in the next movie.

 

[Herolee10]

So just wanted to double check, would most people be fine if the Skywalker saga ends with Kylo being defeated as the big bad in episode 9, with no redemption for their family whatsoever?

 

[SomeOldGuy]

So just wanted to double check, would most people be fine if the Skywalker saga ends with Kylo being defeated as the big bad in episode 9, with no redemption for their family whatsoever?

I don’t think that’s where they’re going with this. Check that: I don’t think it’s where Johnson was going. JJ Lens Flare? Who knows.

 

[C. Lee]

I'm not convinced we saw what really happened between Kylo and Luke and I'm not convinced Kylo is being as honest with Rey as Vader was with Luke. In fact, I'm pretty sure he isn't.

My feeling also. We saw several versions of what occurred between Luke and Ren....are there more that we haven't seen yet? As for Ren and Rey about her parents.....he is trying to coerce her into joining him. What could get her to join him quicker...(A) your parents were not noble Jedi who tried to save your life from evil killers, but were instead worthless drunken scum who sold you for beer money...or...(B) Uh, well....your father was Luke Skywalker, who after you were born to the love of his life Mara Jade, he saw her murdered before his eyes and you attacked by the same killers in an attempt by the ultimate evil in the galaxy to destroy his bloodline...he decided to hide you away from them to save your life. Yeah.....Kylo Ren....he follows the dark side, he works for the people wanting to enslave the galaxy, he murdered his father in cold blood....but he doesn't lie....that would just be rude to do.

 

[Spider-Fan]

My feeling also. We saw several versions of what occurred between Luke and Ren....are there more that we haven't seen yet? As for Ren and Rey about her parents.....he is trying to coerce her into joining him. What could get her to join him quicker...(A) your parents were not noble Jedi who tried to save your life from evil killers, but were instead worthless drunken scum who sold you for beer money...or...(B) Uh, well....your father was Luke Skywalker, who after you were born to the love of his life Mara Jade, he saw her murdered before his eyes and you attacked by the same killers in an attempt by the ultimate evil in the galaxy to destroy his bloodline...he decided to hide you away from them to save your life. Yeah.....Kylo Ren....he follows the dark side, he works for the people wanting to enslave the galaxy, he murdered his father in cold blood....but he doesn't lie....that would just be rude to do.

Spoiler

Kylo didn't say it though. Rey did. Kylo merely pushed her to voice what she already knew. So, I don't think it is a lie.

 

[Mjölnir]

Yeah the biggest hero tales out the biggest villain.

How many times should we play out this predictable trope in movies?

Also, Luke is not the ideal Jedi. I'd say Obi Wan and Yoda were both more wiser and more benevolent.

It makes sense that he would be naive to think he could rebuild the jedi order better than before without repeating the same mistakes. He has no where the amount of training and experience as past jedi masters.

It makes sense he would be tempted to kill his evil nephew since he almost killed Vader in a moment of rage. (I doubt Yoda or Obi Wan would've lost themselves in anger like that)

It also makes sense he would retire after seeing the jedi order fall twice through his father and nephew.

That's more than most jedi have personally witnessed.

The point wasn't that Luke takes out Snoke, the issue was about trying. It would have made a lot of sense if they had explained why he never went about dealing with Snoke at any point, given what we've learned about Luke in the OT. Trying and failing to do so is one of the many reasons Luke could go away (and he could go away due to that failure for many reasons as well) so it doesn't even create an entirely different story if that's not desired.

Luke is definitely a more actively heroic figure than Yoda has been in the movies. Not that I'm knocking Yoda as he's very old by the time we see him and he has a lot of responsibilities, and he's not void of active heroism.

I don't think he's naive to rebuild, I think that was what Obi-Wan and Yoda hoped he would do. They don't seem to have been around to guide him either so they too probably thought he was capable.

As for making himself more ready to strike down the defenseless Ben than he did the defenseless Vader while in rage and under dark side influence, I've stated my opinions about that enough in recent posts so I don't think anyone needs to read them again here.

 

[MessiahDecoy123]

Obi Wan and Yoda wanted Luke to sacrifice his friends to stay and train so that he would become more powerful than Vader. There intent was for Luke to kill him. Luke decides to save his friends.

In Return of the Jedi, Luke tells both Obi Wan and Yoda that he cannot kill his father. He even has a chance to near the end of the movie, but decides against it.

I also think the Hitler comparison is a horrible example. Is this baby my nephew? Is he being manipulated by someone more powerful? Does he have unique gifts? Is he struggling to be evil? Also, how do we know for certain that he will be Hitler?

One of my favorite traits about Luke is his ability to see change in even the worst person. People aren't simply good vs. evil. Its why I fail to see how, or why Luke would turn his back on Kylo. "Only a Sith deals in absolute"

1) The problem is you guys want the Luke from the end of RotJ who just completed the naive farmboy to badass jedi character arc which would be fine for a movie that takes place the following year but kind of boring after 30 years. So Luke is supposed to be a stoic Jedi master who bails out the resistence for three decades?

Not only is that implausible it's also pretty boring. Luke needed a NEW character arc, one with tragedy and peesonal growth. One with human error over three decades.

2) You guys are using mental gymnastics to dismiss the baby Hitler question. You're a jedi master who knows your nephew inside and out and know for a fact he will oppress and kill billions. Do you kill him when you have a chance?

 

[MessiahDecoy123]

Wasn't it because Vader threatened Leia? Guess she doesn't matter to him now... Besides that, Luke stopped himself.

Nepotism justifies killing the baddie nut not saving billions and an entire galaxy?

 

[MessiahDecoy123]

My thoughts were that Luke saw something to redeem in his father (a "spark" as this movie is so fond of using). He saw nothing to redeem in Kylo.

That too.

 

[BatLobster]

I think it could go either way with Kylo. Even though he's a pretty horrible person, they definitely have a sympathetic backstory for him in place and interesting motivations, and I think Rey still has sympathy for him too. The look they share towards the end. They can go either way with whether he will be redeemed, and I think both would actually work.

That's what's kinda funny to me about people who are acting like Rian threw JJ's vision entirely out the window and ruined the saga forever. These things are movies, but as George always said it's all a big soap opera too. JJ has room to do almost anything, including with Rey's parents (they may have been 'normies', but she still may discover she has a place in this story after all...or she may not.)

Also, let's not forget that JJ himself thought the Episode VIII script was so good that he was jealous he wasn't directing it. I'm seeing a lot of overdramatic stuff about how mean ol' Rian Johnson hated TFA and tore up JJ's story. I'm prettttty sure JJ was also far more concerned with the characters and their journeys than who Snoke was too.

 

[Webhead38]

This is what I always hoped would happen with Luke. I wanted to see him become the villain in this new story arc. Why? Because I felt the end of Jedi created a perfect storm of events to lure him to the dark side.

Through the choices he made in saving his father's spiritual life, he also created an emotional bond with him before he died, creating a conflict that would probably not service him well in peace time. He now had to sort out everything that had happen to him and find reason to justify his bonding moment.

Before this conflict, he lived under the lie that his father was killed in battle. He was lied to not only by his Aunt and Uncle but also by Obi Wan. Finding out his father was alive and having a moment to not only connect but relate in various ways through the Force had to be the most genuine moment he had ever experienced. That kind of relevance had to make it difficult to reconcile good and bad considering how he had been manipulated in the process by those he had entrusted.

I think he had to find some way to balance the two sides which, in my mind, made his father a likely sympathetic person for him, leaving the specter of the dark side open to new interpretation.

After I saw TFA, I felt encouraged because Luke had become this hermit. That felt compelling to me because it lined up with my notion that he was succumbing to the dark side because he couldn't make peace with his father's demise. He wanted to champion him and there seem no other way to do that but through the emotional trappings of the dark side.

I felt he likely understood the misgivings of that but felt himself slipping into that abyss and wanted to isolate himself. Had we gotten some backstory that could play to that, I might have better reasoned his scene with Kylo because then you could see his ambivalence and slide taking place. But we never got that backstory so his motivations in that scene were out of place with the stated knowledge of his character.

I think Luke would have been far more interesting as the arch nemesis because he had come from the good side so his ability to anticipate would have been far reaching against his opponents. His fall from grace could have been epic and not at all predictable.

From a practical side it would have been wonderful because Hamill has made his post-Star Wars career out of being iconic villains. Oh what color he could have brought to that role. And from that Disney could have raised up the new generation to fight him and thus usher in a different brand of Jedi for a new era. I think it would have been compelling by every measure.

So seeing him become just another Obi Wan was never on my radar. Seeing him just burn out was even less of a consideration the way it played here.

 

[MessiahDecoy123]

So if certain fans were in Luke's shoes they would've simply expelled Kylo knowing he would go on to commit mass genocide and subjugate billions.

Wow, that Luke is so noble.

 

[Spider-Fan]

Luke as a villain I simply reject that idea. Episode 8 was better.

 

[BatLobster]

Life is messy sometimes. I like that the situation is one where you can feel sympathy for both Luke and Kylo.

It also kinda reminds me a bit of Anakin's self-fulfilling prophecy with turning/Padme's death, which is a nice bit of rhyming. Although the difference here is I truly believe Kylo was turning no matter what and Luke merely accelerated it.

 

[Webhead38]

Luke as a villain I simply reject that idea. Episode 8 was better.

I'm not sure how you find that in opposition since the suggestion in Last Jedi states he was always susceptible. Their remedy was to make him cowardly and afraid. For me, that does not fit within the arc of his character. His tendencies were to always fight for a cause, not surrender to his fears. My idea only states he overcompensated to save his dad which left him susceptible to be lured in when there was no opposition to give him balance.

 

[Herolee10]

So if certain fans were in Luke's shoes they would've simply expelled Kylo knowing he would go on to commit mass genocide and subjugate billions.

Wow, that Luke is so noble.

I don't think expelling him would have been the answer either. Imho, Luke should have just tried harder to reach out to Ben's goodness, no matter how long it took.

 

[Herolee10]

Luke as a villain I simply reject that idea. Episode 8 was better.

Luke as a failed Jedi master is also another concept that I have a hard time process. Frankly, I would have preferred the EU canon version of Luke over the one that we got on this film.

 

[Brother Jack]

Also, let's not forget that JJ himself thought the Episode VIII script was so good that he was jealous he wasn't directing it. I'm seeing a lot of overdramatic stuff about how mean ol' Rian Johnson hated TFA and tore up JJ's story. I'm prettttty sure JJ was also far more concerned with the characters and their journeys than who Snoke was too.

Yeah, for as much autonomy as Johnson seemingly had with this movie, there's no way he wasn't bouncing ideas off of Abrams and the Lucasfilm story group. He wrote the script while VII was still shooting. It's not as though nobody knew what he was cooking up.

 

[MessiahDecoy123]

I don't think expelling him would have been the answer either. Imho, Luke should have just tried harder to reach out to Ben's goodness, no matter how long it took.

Not everyone can be saved.

Han found out the hard way.

 

[writer0327]

Wasn't it because Vader threatened Leia? Guess she doesn't matter to him now... Besides that, Luke stopped himself.

He contemplated killing Vader is the point. He wasn't just hacking at him for the fun of it.

And he stopped himself from killing Ben Solo as well.

 

[writer0327]

I don't think expelling him would have been the answer either. Imho, Luke should have just tried harder to reach out to Ben's goodness, no matter how long it took.

I agree. Luke made the wrong choice in not attempting to save Ben Solo; the film inasmuch tells us this. I think the film also indicates that saving Ben was also a lost cause. One of these SW things where destiny is inevitable. There's no wiggle room around Kylo Ren and his future. But Luke didn't have to turn his back on the galaxy because he screwed up.