Personally, I’ll always wish that George had given us a Sequel Trilogy storyline to the OT back in 1999, instead of the Prequel Trilogy he focused on - I recall seeing interviews with Mark, Harrison, and Carrie from around that period, and they all looked wonderful despite being much older than their earlier OT glory days.
The thing is, I’m sure George could have easily come up with a new Sequel Trilogy which would have involved the whole OT gang onscreen together again some way, at this point. But alas, I got the likes of Jar Jar stepping in poodoo instead.
And by the time the actual Sequel Trilogy came along, J.J. ended up coming up with a TFA storyline which ‘estranged’ Luke, Han, and Leia from each other…and which killed off Han…thus depriving me of a potential ‘reunion’ scene with those 3 characters in it’s follow-up.
Which all added up to a missed opportunity, as far as I’m concerned.
However, we are where we are, and now Rian has conceived a TLJ storyline which seems to dliberately subvert certain expectations, and actually dismiss some of the things set up by J.J.'s instalment.
Fair enough, but it’s going to be interesting to see how things pan out due to the unforeseen loss of Carrie, and the fact that J.J. is back in the driver’s seat for the next chapter.
Anyway, with a few alterations it seems possible to tweak TLJ into something I’d much prefer to see - something a lot less ‘jokey’ in tone overall, but which retains the humorous moments I happen to like.
But as I recently mentioned on page 14 of this thread, the MAIN thing I’d like to alter for myself is how the ‘Luke being tempted to kill his nephew’ scene was handled - Well, what I’d originally intended to do was just make Luke tell Rey THE TRUTH STRAIGHT AWAY about his ‘brief temptation to kill Kylo’, when first recounting his ‘backstory’ concerning Kylo to her - this at least would make him seem less evasive about it than the movie does.
However, I had the opportunity to go and see TLJ for a third and final time with another family member the other day, and was pleased to confirm that I could cobble together a version of the ‘Kylo backstory’ I’m even more satisfied with…which DOESN’T involve Luke being ‘tempted to kill Kylo’ with his lightsaber at all! 😃
So here’s how I intend to alter things for myself -
…at the point where Luke starts to tell Rey about Kylo, he ends up saying “…by the time I realised I was no match for the darkness rising in him…it was too late…” (at this point we see Luke in close-up, as Rey whispers “What happened?”)
…then I’d CUT to the close-up of Kylo asleep as Luke’s voice-over continues “…I’d sensed it building in him…”, and as the shot pans up to reveal Luke standing nearby with his hand outstretched, we’d continue with the rest of Luke’s voice-over until we eventually see his anguished face in close-up as his voice-over ends on him saying “…Snoke had already turned his heart…”
…then at this point, I’d CUT to the shot of the ‘training temple’ as we hear the words “I went to confront him, but he turned on me”, as we then see Luke being violently ‘forced pushed’ through the wall by Kylo’s arms, as Luke yells “BEN, NO!”…and continue on from that shot as per the movie, where we then see the scene of devastation as Luke’s voice continues “He must have thought I was dead…”, and continue on as we see the younger ‘hooded Luke’ in close-up as his voice-over ends with “…I failed…”
…and continue on from that as per the movie, as we revert back to ‘old Luke’ in close-up as he says “…because I was Luke Skywalker, Jedi Master…a legend…”
…and continue on from that as per the movie, as Rey responds and eventually says “…you didn’t fail Kylo, Kylo failed you…I wont!” (as we end in a close-up of her face)
So NO ‘moment of lightsaber madness’ needed whatsoever, and I’m quite content to have Kylo’s flawed personality and Snoke’s influence be the main object of Kylo’s ‘turn to the dark side’ for my version…which Luke could do nothing about at the time, except feel that he let Leia and Han down extremely badly.
(and of course, that requires a certain amount of removal/re-structuring of some later scenes too, which allows me to alter some other moments I’m not keen on either) 😃