For some reason, I really dig showing a ‘badass’ Luke in such an unconventional manner. We WANT to see Luke flash his green lightsaber and go absolutely ham on the baddies with a swish and a shoosh. Instead they showed Luke handle the situation differently. Do you think Luke really wanted to duel Vader back in ROTJ? No, he wanted to live up to Yoda’s early teaching of “knowledge and defense, never attack” but Vader managed to push his emotional buttons to make him choose an agressive action.
Here, Luke found a way to help his friends that involved him tapping into the knowledge of the Force in a defensive tactic without laying a finger on Kylo. Would it be fucking badass to see Luke actually duel? Yeah, and it’s also fucking cool to see Star Destroyer, Imperial Walker, and Vader slashing Rebels but ultimately, those were easy cheap tricks to appease fans, to give them what they want without reason (yes, I’m looking at you Rogue One).
Yeah, but the thing that bugs me is, that he didn’t help those friends for many years, and just sat on a rock waiting to die. Even the death of his best friend and the fact that his sister was in a coma didn’t change his mind. You speak of cheap tricks, but isn’t it much more cheap to prop up Rey by having her beat Luke in a short battle with sticks? She get’s the better of him, and could have lopped his head of with the lightsaber, if she wasn’t one of the good guys. Jedi Master Luke get’s beaten by a girl, who up till a few days earlier believed he was the stuff of legends. Shouldn’t such blatant disregard for the established in-universe rules bug you just a little bit? Yoda once said: a Jedi must have the most serious mind, the deepest commitment. Does this film do that line justice? It took Luke an entire training sequence to learn how to lift a few rocks with his mind, and we’re supposed to accept that Rey can move tons of rocks to free our heroes easier than Yoda can lift an X-wing? Are we now supposed to believe Luke could have gotten three basic lessons in the Force (of which only one actually involved the Force), and then beat Darth Vader in a fight, because that’s more or less what happens in this movie.
If got a duel where he faced Kylo in a traditional manner, well, it would mean Luke’s character was really thrown out the window. What we have is a sorrowful and broken
It would mean there wouldn’t be any Kylo at the end of TLJ. If Rey could beat Kylo in the forrest, surely Luke can beat his former pupil with ease, the same pupil, that needed Rey’s help to defeat those guards in Snoke’s throne room.
Luke that couldn’t handle the burden of recreating the Jedi Order alone after failing basically the galaxy and his friends. Rey can now pick up where he left off, now becoming one with the Force, he has the chance to always be there when Rey needs his guidance. Perhaps this is what Luke needed after all this time, someone strong in the Force without the emotional baggage and weight and cynicism.
Yeah, but Luke was strong in the Force without the cynicism. That was his character, until RJ decided to change things. We already had that hero. Was it really needed to turn Luke into a cynic, such that his successor can look like a hero?
Bottom line though, what I’m saying is that I flinch a little at suggesting there’s disappointment in not having battle-badass Luke. It’s kinda like asking for the fan service treatment found in Rogue One and this is something we need to stay away from. Constraint leads to something more creative, like Force projection, which also helps keep passive Luke in-tact.
I’m not so sure everyone who’s critical wanted badass Luke. I didn’t. I did however expect Luke to have grown beyond the person who allways looks at the horizon, as Yoda says he still does in TLJ. I thought he had grown beyond that in ROTJ, but this film tries to sell the argument, that Luke didn’t grow at all for the last few years, and needs untrained Rey to guide him and tell him what’s right, rather than the other way around.