Johnson just didn't follow any of the pre-established rules of the force. He was constantly making up new force abilities to solve problems. That's just lazy writing. If anything I'd say he did the opposite of what you're saying. There was no grey, except for Luke, and even then he wasn't really grey, he'd just messed up. All the other force users were 2 dimensional archetypes of good and evil. Kyle and Rae's "struggle" was half-assed and really nothing more than lip service that led to big action scenes. It felt like Johnson didn't finish his own script, with the moving just jumping forward without exploring or resolving the issues.
I'd even say Luke was less grey than before, because he originally saw how somebody who went to the dark side could actually come back (something Obi Wan and Yoda didn't even believe), to somebody who was willing to kill a teenager in their sleep because they saw some dark in them. Then of course finished the movie without really pushing any sort of agenda or mission for Rey.
It is a little baffling to see TFA ideas just tossed aside though. Like, did no one plan out a 3 movie arc? Just winging it from movie to movie seems like a pretty poor strategy for such a big franchise, but that really looks like what we are getting.
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It is a little baffling to see TFA ideas just tossed aside though. Like, did no one plan out a 3 movie arc? Just winging it from movie to movie seems like a pretty poor strategy for such a big franchise, but that really looks like what we are getting.
Somebody correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm nearly 100% positive that when TFA was released that was the only script they had written for the trilogy. So yes, I'm pretty sure winging it is exactly what they're doing. I agree that it's not working too well. Each film as a standalone movie is okay but I don't feel like they tie into each other very well at all.
Where are people getting the idea Johnson has set up some sort of 'grey' universe?
We are back to the Rebels vs. the Empire and Light Force User (now complete with the old Jedi texts) vs. Dark Force User.
Except for the Rebels vs Rebels and Empire vs Empire parts.
The mutiny against Holdo was probably the dumbest part of the movie. Make the rebels look like an undisciplined rabble just to give one character a bit of an arc.
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I mean, isn't that Kathleen Kennedy's job? Like...her whole job.
There's actually a guy at Disney who's job description is something like the Creator of the Holocron, and his job is to make sure that the movies and books and TV shows actually make sense in the Star Wars universe and that things kind of flow together. He's also the guy who keeps the continuity database up to date.
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There's actually a guy at Disney who's job description is something like the Creator of the Holocron, and his job is to make sure that the movies and books and TV shows actually make sense in the Star Wars universe and that things kind of flow together. He's also the guy who keeps the continuity database up to date.
Right but he’s not making decisions on whether they choose to break them or not. That’s Kennedy’s job via the development phase of every film. Like Feige for Marvel.
There's actually a guy at Disney who's job description is something like the Creator of the Holocron, and his job is to make sure that the movies and books and TV shows actually make sense in the Star Wars universe and that things kind of flow together. He's also the guy who keeps the continuity database up to date.
I was thinking about the whole starship chase, we're running out of fuel story line, which to me was kind of silly, since fuel has never been a concern in the Star Wars Galaxy. I mean all of the capital ships from the PT to the OT to the Death Star have all run on reactors. Hence why these things seem to be so easy to destroy.
They even had the technology that's in Canon because of Rebels and even in TCWs and that Interdictor technology which is a ship mounted system that creates a gravity well that prevents ships from jumping to light speed.
Its still something that they can blow up, the mechanics of the plot would have remained the same except it could be made clear that the First Order was herding them towards a trap of some kind like another fleet.
You could still have the whole tense countdown with the trap being sprung in 6 hours things. You could make it so the ships can't go to light speed as long as the Interdictor cruiser is still alive. And you can still have it that after the cruiser is destroyed that The Rebel Cruiser still takes out Snokes flag ship because he's shooting on the shuttles. heck you could even put the Interdictor tech on Snoke's ship, I mean the thing was big enough, and I noticed that Snoke's ship was just outright bigger then the Executor from Empire.
I mean Luke flew half way across the galaxy in a X-Wing and never stopped for Gas. Han's problem in Empire wasn't fuel, he could fly through entire solar systems but his hyper drive was shot.
Just out of interest, I looked up a couple of things
FO Resurgent Star Destroyer's length is 2900 meters The Imperial Star Destroyer was 1600 meters, and the Resurgent carries twice as many fighters and crew and Storm Troopers.
Here's where it gets funny, Snokes Star Destroyer, the Supremecy was 13000 meters long and 16000 meters wide. Compared to the Super Star Destroyer the Executor, was 16000 meters long and about half of that wide.
Now what is funny because I didn't even think about this until just now when I looked it up. The First Order doesn't have a home planet or a seat of government at all. There's no capital world, the Supremecy was not only a super ship, but it was the seat of power for the entire First Order. So all of its leaders, probably all of its technology and money and everything were on that ship.
So when someone said that there were only 40 Rebels left and 5 First Order Walkers and Snoke and Hux, he is right. Not only is the Rebellion crippled, but the First order is completely crippled. So the weird question becomes one of lost opportunity. Once the Supremecy was destroyed, wouldn't the message to Leia's buddies be basically "We just destroyed the first order's seat of government, and most of their fleet, they have 5 walkers on the planet and one gun that has to be dragged in to place. This is our opportunity to finish off the First Order". And as a rebel, wouldn't you jump at that.
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Last edited by CaptainCrunch; 01-01-2018 at 01:47 AM.
I was thinking about the whole starship chase, we're running out of fuel story line, which to me was kind of silly, since fuel has never been a concern in the Star Wars Galaxy. I mean all of the capital ships from the PT to the OT to the Death Star have all run on reactors. Hence why these things seem to be so easy to destroy.
Heh. I was joking about that with my wife, when she asked me about it after the movie. "How much gas do those things usually have? How long does it take them to run out of fuel?"
I enjoyed The Last Jedi. It was an entertaining film with fun action and a good mix of humour with serious themes. The Yoda appearance, the throne room scene, and Luke facing the First Order were all great and rank on the list of greatest Star Wars moments. Unfortunately it was far from perfect suffering from issues with pacing, tone and being 20 minutes too long.
I really liked the main story line with Rey, Luke, Kylo, and Snoke. I loved seeing bitter old Luke and thought the direction they were taking the Force was cool. The Kylo/Rey relation ship was interesting and I enjoyed the throne scene and killing of Snoke. It would have been nice to get background on Snoke and some training of Kylo but these are minor issues.
I thought the chase story was okay. I liked the running out of fuel angle as something different and liked the development of Poe but thought the mutiny stuff was silly and overall it was a bad copy of the chase from Empire. The new captain was poorly written and seemed really stupid and unlikable. I did not care at all when she died.
The part of the movie I absolutely hated was the casino trip. It was a jarring change in tone while serving very little purpose for the story or character development. It even managed to make Finn, my favourite character in TFA, one of my least favourite in this one. Things did improve however once they got on the First Order ship. I also was not a fan of Rose. She was cliche, her saving Finn was so lame and predictable, and it looks like we are now going to get some annoying Finn/Rey/Rose love triangle in Episode IX.
I think better editing would have really helped this one and they could have ended up with a 2 hour movie with a more concise story and consistent tone. Add more to the training of Rey and Kylo while providing background on Rey and Snoke at the expense of the casino and mutiny. I also feel they could have improved the ending by shortening the time between the deaths of Snoke and Luke. These were awesome but I have no idea which one was the climax and it created a situation where the main protagonist had very little to do for the last 20 minutes.
Something else I was thinking about is how this one didn't feel like a part 2 in a trilogy. It clearly was a sequel to TFA however ignored so much of its' predecessor. We are told Kylo is going to be trained by Snoke yet this never happens, it is hinted at that Rey has an interesting and complicated history with a connection to the light sabre yet she turns out to be a nobody, Luke leaves a map yet is upset when someone finds him, and Finn goes through an arc where he decides to do the right thing and not run away yet in this one the first thing he does is try to run away. It also doensn't set much up for Episode IX as there are no cliff hangers or mysteries to get intrigued about. It will be interesting to see where they go in IX but seems odd there doesn't currently seem to be an over arcing trilogy story.
Overall I had fun at the cinema and TLJ is a solid entry in the Star Wars universe. This has too many problems to be a classic however and was not one of the top 5 movies I saw in 2017. 8/10
Also, my wife provided a much shorter review: "I enjoyed it but it seems like they are just milking the originals at this point. I'm starting to be over Star Wars."
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Somebody correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm nearly 100% positive that when TFA was released that was the only script they had written for the trilogy. So yes, I'm pretty sure winging it is exactly what they're doing. I agree that it's not working too well. Each film as a standalone movie is okay but I don't feel like they tie into each other very well at all.
This really is the whole problem with an otherwise enjoyable, escapist movie. I think you are going to see a big box office drop with the 3rd installment.
I think you are going to see a big box office drop with the 3rd installment.
I highly doubt it. You might see a slight drop simply due to over-saturation, as by the time it's released there will have been 5 Star Wars movies in 5 years (including the Han Solo prequel) . But I predict Episode IX will still rake in at least $900 million worldwide.
I was thinking about the whole starship chase, we're running out of fuel story line, which to me was kind of silly, since fuel has never been a concern in the Star Wars Galaxy. I mean all of the capital ships from the PT to the OT to the Death Star have all run on reactors. Hence why these things seem to be so easy to destroy.
They even had the technology that's in Canon because of Rebels and even in TCWs and that Interdictor technology which is a ship mounted system that creates a gravity well that prevents ships from jumping to light speed.
Its still something that they can blow up, the mechanics of the plot would have remained the same except it could be made clear that the First Order was herding them towards a trap of some kind like another fleet.
You could still have the whole tense countdown with the trap being sprung in 6 hours things. You could make it so the ships can't go to light speed as long as the Interdictor cruiser is still alive. And you can still have it that after the cruiser is destroyed that The Rebel Cruiser still takes out Snokes flag ship because he's shooting on the shuttles. heck you could even put the Interdictor tech on Snoke's ship, I mean the thing was big enough, and I noticed that Snoke's ship was just outright bigger then the Executor from Empire.
I mean Luke flew half way across the galaxy in a X-Wing and never stopped for Gas. Han's problem in Empire wasn't fuel, he could fly through entire solar systems but his hyper drive was shot.
Just out of interest, I looked up a couple of things
FO Resurgent Star Destroyer's length is 2900 meters The Imperial Star Destroyer was 1600 meters, and the Resurgent carries twice as many fighters and crew and Storm Troopers.
Here's where it gets funny, Snokes Star Destroyer, the Supremecy was 13000 meters long and 16000 meters wide. Compared to the Super Star Destroyer the Executor, was 16000 meters long and about half of that wide.
Now what is funny because I didn't even think about this until just now when I looked it up. The First Order doesn't have a home planet or a seat of government at all. There's no capital world, the Supremecy was not only a super ship, but it was the seat of power for the entire First Order. So all of its leaders, probably all of its technology and money and everything were on that ship.
So when someone said that there were only 40 Rebels left and 5 First Order Walkers and Snoke and Hux, he is right. Not only is the Rebellion crippled, but the First order is completely crippled. So the weird question becomes one of lost opportunity. Once the Supremecy was destroyed, wouldn't the message to Leia's buddies be basically "We just destroyed the first order's seat of government, and most of their fleet, they have 5 walkers on the planet and one gun that has to be dragged in to place. This is our opportunity to finish off the First Order". And as a rebel, wouldn't you jump at that.
I seriously doubt Johnson put that much thought into it, or chose to look at the universe deeply enough to create that level of consistency. The First Order will be back at full strength next movie. The new star destroyer was nothing but a bigger and badder cgi monster.
So on that theory, they could have, at any point, crippled the First Order by sending a single heavy cruiser on a kamikaze run.
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I seriously doubt Johnson put that much thought into it, or chose to look at the universe deeply enough to create that level of consistency. The First Order will be back at full strength next movie. The new star destroyer was nothing but a bigger and badder cgi monster.
It makes you wonder where the First Order acquired all of these resources.
I mean, the Empire was at least the Galactic Governing body so you could assume that they just misappropriated Government funds for military defense spending like a couple of Nations that we could mention.
But that doesnt appear to be the case here. Where do they get all the money for these ships and Death Star guns and solider's pay and pensions and such.
The Empire was an industrial war machine, the First Order arent.
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I highly doubt it. You might see a slight drop simply due to over-saturation, as by the time it's released there will have been 5 Star Wars movies in 5 years (including the Han Solo prequel) . But I predict Episode IX will still rake in at least $900 million worldwide.
This one will probably break $1.5 Billion worldwide, and it would be surprising to not see nine will do better than that.
I think forcasting IX Canada/US Total is hard right now.
If They can't pull Solo together, and they announce 5 more movies in the first half of the 20's and the reviews are mixed again IX could dip below $600 million, worse than this one.
If Solo is better than the production problems have suggested, and they announce they will rest the brand for 5+ years, and the previews/reviews are great it could do as much a $1 billion domestically slightly ahead of The Force Awakens. But I don't see all of that happening, especially Disney giving the brand some needed rest.
It makes you wonder where the First Order acquired all of these resources.
I mean, the Empire was at least the Galactic Governing body so you could assume that they just misappropriated Government funds for military defense spending like a couple of Nations that we could mention.
But that doesnt appear to be the case here. Where do they get all the money for these ships and Death Star guns and solider's pay and pensions and such.
The Empire was an industrial war machine, the First Order arent.
They covered it off in the books that came out after TFA.
As far as the leadership goes, as JJ says they talked about what would have happened if the Nazi's had fled to Argentina in larger numbers after Hitler's death and had a chance to fix the failures of the Empire, and come out organized.
The best and brightest and most hardcore leaders and officers fled to the outer rim of the galaxy, and that was always the problem with the Republic, they just didn't care about what happened away from the core of the galaxy.
In the outer Rim, the First Order colonized worlds for their resources, at the same time they raised money by basically running the under ground crime rings in the inner core, they basically became a crime syndicate which allowed them to do a couple of things. First of all they made a ton of money on weapons deals and illegal activities like drugs and smuggling and other things. Second of all, they created a lot of disenfranchised worlds that felt that the Republic was weak and indecisive so a lot of outer rim worlds just fell into the First Orders grasp, its probably also why a lot of Leia's allies didn't respond to their cry for help.
They also managed to get weapons manufacturers to make them weapons on the side under the Republics nose while they built ship yards and training facilities in the outer rim.
The Republic was also content after signing a peace treaty with the old Empire to the point of allowing the remnants of the Empire join the Republic and keeps some key inner core worlds and the Republic turned their attention to the business of peace and started disarming, they thought they could do what the old republic did under the Rusaan Resolution which is not have a centralized military but instead let planets defend themselves.
Tensions however rose whether stirred up by the First Order or not between the old Empire Remnant Worlds in the inner core and the Republic leading to a Cold War between the two sides. This lead to a fracturing of the Republic as these Imperial Remnant Worlds seceded from the Republic and joined the First Order giving the New Empire a large foot hold in the inner core.
When you have a gffa with the population that it had, it wouldn't take long for illegal activities and weapons sales to worlds to raise the type of funds that the First Order did.
While the Republic was aware of the First Order during the "Cold War" they thought they were a weak and disorganized group of fanatics that would burn out or be defeated on the Outer Rim by planets that didn't want a return to the Empire. Instead these worlds pretty much welcomed them because the First Order promised stability and Order.
To avoid the one big failure of the Empire, the also created a three person leadership group in the First Order so that one man's mistakes would not lead to their downfall. They created a ruling council which was military controlled.
General Hux was given command of the first order Naval Forces. Captain Phasma was given command of the First Order ground forces which were pretty much exclusive made up of the First Order Storm Trooper Corps. Supreme Leader Snoke was at the head of that triangle.
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If Solo is better than the production problems have suggested, and they announce they will rest the brand for 5+ years, and the previews/reviews are great it could do as much a $1 billion domestically slightly ahead of The Force Awakens. But I don't see all of that happening, especially Disney giving the brand some needed rest.
I don't see Disney giving any rest at all. More likely we are going to start seeing 3-4 Star Wars universe movies per year much like Marvel and then eventually overlaps like the do in Avengers/GOTG/Spiderman/Thor/Ironman etc.
The hard reset this movie went for seems like an attempt the clean the slate for the next generation of Star Wars sagas with an anything goes, unlimited force powers, everyone can be a jedi style.
I would not be surprised if we see a Star Wars movie with earth in it at this point.
