So I just read something that really made me think, and honestly I agree with pretty much everything. It is as follows:
"At the end of episode VI, the protagonists had achieved something. The Jedi. Redemption. Republic. All those things were systematically annihilated to the point of no return. With TLJ, the current artists have said that there is no impact done by the heroes of the original trilogy, and have set to kill them all, break down what they have built, and salt the earth. Not a single thing they have built stood, and it has all been washed away. This was not necessary to tell a story: you could tell a story where a Jedi Order or a Republic existed, even if far away, in another corner of the galaxy. You could tell good stories with that. But they have decided, explicitly, to destroy everything the heroes have built, show their success means nothing, and kill them all.
And if they did not intend to do that, well. Are they incapable of thinking? Because that is what they did.
They have shown that victory is fleeting and has no meaning, for all evil has to do is sneeze and remove everything that has been won from the board. All of it. All will crumble so easily. I don’t… really feel good about Star Wars, and may even skip Episode IX at this moment, since… if they win? What then? It will be another desperate fight to the last moment against a superior foe (and hint, if you don’t want geeks to wank to your villains, you should not make them superior to the heroes in every way, at all times) until they win in the end, at which point, like the end of this, we are told it is all good… but it isn’t, really. They will all just die, and all they did, will just crumble, right around the corner.
Or, worse, they will not. Johnston may go on to direct his trilogy, where heroes will win, and live happily ever after, and gain the rewards of retirement.
This is how artists tend to work, after all - especially the ones beloved of geekdom. Send off your heroes into the sunset. Murder those other people created in ways that make them appear pathetic, lesser, and unimportant. Much like the people who made this movie, geekdom loves the things of their childhoods but also feel so ashamed they want to destroy them to… prove something. I’m not sure what.
I love the current crew. I love Finn, and Rey, and particularly Poe, who may be my favorite Star Wars character of all time (on the note I was on #TeamSkywalker on the original trilogy)… but they are not that much better than the OT crew that the OT crew deserved to have their works annihilated, their successes pissed on, and their lives taken just for their aggrandizement. If anything, this makes me like characters I loved - the new ones - far less. The movie is either very confused on that fact, or pretty clear when it points out Finn shouldn’t sacrifice himself, but then has Luke… sacrifices himself.
And all as tax. He dies because he lost his will to live, without even so much as strangling and having to give birth; all because they had to kill one OT hero per movie, at least. All for something as mechanic as a tax.
He could have just… survived. Been able to go on, to teach a new generation, to learn from his failures rather than to die as one. But that was not allowed.
It just leaves me rather hollow with their views on storytelling, on collaborative storytelling, and on characters, in general."
I don’t agree that Luke gave up and died. What he pulled off we had never seen before and it’s probably something Jedi seldom attempt because it can kill you.
If Obi Wan and Yoda can appear to give sage advice, Luke can teach as a ghost. There’s nothing in the films so far that says he can’t.