yotsuya

DrDre said:

DominicCobb said:

NeverarGreat said:

If Poe had said something along the lines of ‘Retreat, nothing can stop it now!’, then it would have been clear that Finn was acting out of pure unthinking hatred for the First Order.

“The cannon is charged, it’s a suicide run! All craft, pull away!”
“Retreat, Finn! That’s an order.”
“Finn? It’s too late!”

That doesn’t imply a suicide run could not be successful. It might only imply Poe is not willing to sacrifice the few people they have left. Additionally unlike Poe Finn knows the technology, and obviously feels he has a chance of taking out the weapon. So, it’s just a case of the movie providing a poor setup imo.

That is why we get to see the weapons on Finn’s craft crumple. Poe sees it is hopeless, we see it is hopeless, and Finn is on a mission. Rose stops him because he was about to throw his life away for nothing.

Collipso said:

dahmage said:

Jay said:

yotsuya said:

Jay said:

yotsuya said:

Jay said:

Shopping Maul said:

I liked Luke’s vibe in TLJ in theory, but the execution bugged me somewhat. Luke in exile was great. Luke reconsidering past events and pondering (as I have as a fan) the idea of Jedi hubris was great. Luke suggesting that the old Jedi orthodoxy had to die was great. All the stuff about the Force and ‘balance’ and how no-one has a particular claim to it was absolutely great.

What I didn’t like so much was the idea of Luke being on the back foot with all this. Having Yoda come back to give Luke a lecture on ‘failure’ annoyed me. Luke transcended his masters in RoTJ. Yoda and Obi Wan wanted Luke to simply kill the bad guys. Luke chose a more personal, Zen route. I’d prefer he’d been doing the grumpy hobo routine in TLJ as an act - similar to Yoda’s initial test in TESB. This could have been his way of forcing Rey to take her destiny into her own hands, a new and different path away from the usual formalised Jedi training routine. Once Rey had flown off to confront Kylo, Luke could have revealed his cunning duplicity to Yoda and they could’ve burned down the Jedi tree together. Then, after Luke’s great skype-battle with Kylo, Rey could’ve realised what he’d done and be like “you sly devil”.

This way he could’ve played the hobo but still been the Luke we all love and respect without being diminished.

Shopping Maul said:

yotsuya said:

Shopping Maul said:

I liked Luke’s vibe in TLJ in theory, but the execution bugged me somewhat. Luke in exile was great. Luke reconsidering past events and pondering (as I have as a fan) the idea of Jedi hubris was great. Luke suggesting that the old Jedi orthodoxy had to die was great. All the stuff about the Force and ‘balance’ and how no-one has a particular claim to it was absolutely great.

What I didn’t like so much was the idea of Luke being on the back foot with all this. Having Yoda come back to give Luke a lecture on ‘failure’ annoyed me. Luke transcended his masters in RoTJ. Yoda and Obi Wan wanted Luke to simply kill the bad guys. Luke chose a more personal, Zen route. I’d prefer he’d been doing the grumpy hobo routine in TLJ as an act - similar to Yoda’s initial test in TESB. This could have been his way of forcing Rey to take her destiny into her own hands, a new and different path away from the usual formalised Jedi training routine. Once Rey had flown off to confront Kylo, Luke could have revealed his cunning duplicity to Yoda and they could’ve burned down the Jedi tree together. Then, after Luke’s great skype-battle with Kylo, Rey could’ve realised what he’d done and be like “you sly devil”.

This way he could’ve played the hobo but still been the Luke we all love and respect without being diminished.

If you didn’t notice, the scene with Yoda doesn’t alter the more Zen route he took in ROTJ. Yoda isn’t advising him on the force, he is advising him how to teach. Advising him as a fellow master. I think because Luke was so pivotal, Rian didn’t just have him fill the master/mentor role immediately. He brought back some of that negativity that characterized Luke in ANH and TESB. It created a nice character journey for Luke to take him where he needed to be to help Rey.

Yes, but that’s my point - that Luke was brought back to ANH/TESB levels to reboot his arc. Yoda says (in TLJ) “young Skywalker, always looking to the horizon” when it was actually this attitude that saved the day in RoTJ, namely that Luke ‘looked to the horizon’ and took an emotional, idealistic path with regard to the bad guys (as opposed to just killing them).

I just think returning the OT characters to pre-RoTJ status, while not so bad in theory, could’ve been handled better. Leia as rebel leader, rather than Jedi kindergarten teacher, was a no-brainer since her Skywalker heritage was a story convenience that added zero to her character. Han going back to smuggling was kind of dumb - he should have been recruiting pilots from the outer rim or something which would have kept him on his post-RoTJ path while still serving the divorce narrative.

But returning Luke to pre-RoTJ status diminishes RoTJ (and this is coming from someone who doesn’t even like RoTJ!). I think the ‘broken recluse’ idea could have been served in a cleverer way without sending Luke backwards. And he didn’t help Rey. She helped him.

Great interpretations, agree fully. Luke accomplished what his masters couldn’t when he saved his father, and he did it in his own way. Reducing him to a bitter old man who made the same mistakes with his own pupil (except worse, seeing as he considered murder a solution to his failings as a teacher) is to ignore what he accomplished in RotJ. It’s sold as a subversive take on Luke’s character, but it’s really just another reboot and ripoff of a story we’ve already been told.

I didn’t mind the idea of the Jedi Order and its orthodoxy dying out because my interpretation of the prequels has always been that the Jedi became too powerful, influential, and frankly cocky (Yoda speaks to this in AotC I believe), inviting the blindness and corruption that was ultimately the downfall of the Order and the Republic.

Luke experienced an awakening in RotJ and TLJ sets him back for the sake of making Rey look good.

I quite disagree. Luke had faith that his father could be saved and he was right. But seeing the way Luke ended ROTJ as something fundamental had changed with him and he could never fall back to his old defeatist attitude is a false interpretation of the character arc of Luke in the OT. Luke found something to believe in and he believed that the correct course was to rebuild the Jedi. But that failed in a miserable way. It was not just the actions of Luke on that night in Kylo’s hut, but that Kylo had been corrupted to start with and it was too late for Luke to reach him. How did evil penetrate his trailing of his nephew? How could that happen again? Was it in the Skywalker blood? Was it a failing of the Jedi teachings? Why had Kylo fallen? Luke went to the source looking for answers and the only thing he found was that the Jedi were flawed and that flaw had left a hole for Kylo’s fall and while Luke had not caused or been able to prevent it, he had hastened it by listening to his instincts (Ben’s first lesson if you recall - to act on instinct). He had failed his nephew. A tradgedy like that would naturally bring out your defeatist side if that was in your nature (as we saw it was indeed in two movies and still hints of it in ROTJ). It is a very realistic portrayal of a hero and a classic archetype of the former hero as mentor, who has to be convinced to teach. Nothing about the Luke shown in TLJ is contrary to the OT Luke. Quite the reverse. In fact you could say that Luke’s journey in TLJ is very much tied to how his character appeared in ROTJ. Luke is a Jedi of strong emotions. Strong faith and strong doubt.

False interpretation? There’s no such thing. I have my take, you have yours.

As I’ve said multiple times now, I don’t have a problem with Hermit Luke, just the poorly told history that led him to such a place and Rey’s lack of need for any real training to exhibit Force powers that rival Yoda’s. As Shopping Maul said, I have a problem with its execution. I’m just not sold on this version of Luke based on what we’ve been given to work with and I’m not going to perform the mental gymnastics required to get there.

You pose lots of interesting questions, by the way—none of which were answered in TFA or TLJ. I doubt they’ll be answered in IX either.

It is a false interpretation because that is not how human beings are. At their core, all heroes are human beings, just with something special to make them a hero. Hercules had his failings. Luke has his failings. Rian used those to round out Luke’s actions as told in TFA. Luke had a very good day at the end of ROTJ, but on the day Kylo turned against him it was a very bad day. Luke has a bad history with very bad days and there is no reason why having a great day means he will never act the same again on a bad day. That is just ridiculous. Your interpretation builds Luke up to something he is not. That is part of what the story of TLJ is about. Leia and Rey wanted that heroic Luke who took on the Empire, so did a lot of fans. That Luke would be unrealistic. What we got was an epic illusion. He appeared to be the Luke desired, but he was never that Luke. His human side was showing through and he saw no way to help the galaxy except by staying away. Right or wrong, that was his take. In the end he realized the galaxy needed the legend and they got it, just not as they expected it. Better in some ways. But the Luke from the end of ROTJ was still just a Tatooine farm boy at heart. People don’t change in such a fundamental way. That was why Anakin could be saved. He was fundamentally a lost slaveboy who wanted to save his family. Where is that fundamental difference in Kylo. I think his redemption will take a different direction.

Sorry, still not there with you on this, and never will be.

darthrush said:

dahmage said:

Collipso said:

DominicCobb said:

Everyone’s favorite scene in TLJ was when Leia gave Rey a medal that said “Best Jedi Ever.” Truly amazing moment.

yeah because that’s exactly what i meant

Well then I guess I have no idea what you meant, like usual.

Are you kidding? Sometimes it’s like you people don’t want to even acknowledge the other side of something despite Collipso being pretty darn clear.

It’s deliberate and it’s annoying. Just shitposting, really.

Thanks?

No, like Frink said, I really didn’t get collipso’s point. I have taken his posts literally before, only to be told they were sarcasm, and I found myself scratching my head wondering which this was.

I was traveling all day, so only now saw this, and figured I better speak my price, lest you think I really was being pointlessly belligerent.

Back on topic, I agree with yotsuya’s post above.

i’m sorry i wasn’t clear dahmage. to explain the post you didn’t understand: i was pretty angry with some IRL stuff and gave a more emotional response than usual, and ended up using a super ultra hyperbole. i said rey’s the “best jedi ever”, but what i really meant was that she’s quite capable jedi-wise two movies in already and she had 0 training so far, so i don’t see why IX’s writers would go out of their ways in the final movie of the trilogy to give her some sort of training, given that it’s been pretty clear that it’s not necessary to her.

again, sorry for coming across as unclear to you quite often. you’re one of the posters i enjoy the most here and i’ll try to improve from now on to avoid complications in the future.

If we are going to have an end to the Skywalker Saga and balance the force, Rey must reach a point no Jedi before has reached and she can only reach it because she has not been properly trained. Luke sees the Jedi did something wrong and he needs to help Rey see it. But Luke was trained, by Ben, Yoda, and then what he could find. He became a classic Jedi and it could not help him save his nephew from falling. There was something missing in the Jedi lore that Luke, Rey, and Kylo have to find to complete the story. Rey’s ability with the force is meaningless. She is a natural. They exist in every field. What Rey needs is not trailing in force abilities, but to find wisdom and purpose and a way to balance the force long term. She needs a teacher and mentor, not to learn how to levitate rocks, but to create a new Jedi order that fixes the failings of the Old Republic Jedi order.

No, TLJ doesn’t exist in a vacuum. But when looking at it in context of the other films one thing you shouldn’t be doing is reading motives into things you don’t like. Unless you have some insight from something other than the films that the people making these films have some secret message or motive, you are just talking nonsense. As one saying that frequently goes around writers circles goes, an English teachers expounds on the meaning of blue in a particular work and when you ask the author they reply that there is no meaning, they just meant the color blue. When you try to put motives to people without a shred of proof beyond what you imagine you are seeing in the films, you are just making things up out of thin air. That I have a problem with. When you lift up Luke beyond his all to well documented human failings and say TLJ failed because Rian Johnson tapped into that humanity, you are falling prey to creating unrealistic expectations of the character. Rian even played on that in the story. He knew what you were thinking and took the character in a more interesting direction. That you don’t like that is fine, but stop taking your criticism of the direction he went and building this big conspiracy around it. You don’t like it. We get it. But if you come at it from a ridiculous set of expectations, I’m going to have something to say.

I come at this from the writer’s point of view. Writers have to be somewhat free to tell the story that compels them. Rian Johnson is a Star Wars fan. JJ Abrams is a Star Wars fan. It colors what they do with the characters. Their stories fit with the characters as they see them. It is not some great Disney or Lucasfilm conspiracy. It is them taking creative license to tell a story within a framework. I see what they were doing as I saw what Lucas did with the PT. There are some you can’t defend. There is a lot you can. Lucas sucked at dialog and performance choices. He could write a killer story. Abrams is great at crafting characters but is miserable at editing and endings. Rian likes to delve into the character and be more subtle. Their inspirations color what they do. Lucas was trying to create a movie serial (2 hour episodes similar to the old Buck Rogers and Flash Gordon) and he imbibed it with WWII and Samurai influences. I can’t really speak for Abrams, but Rian was open that he watched Twelve O’clock High, Three Outlaw Samurai, and To Catch A Thief to prepare for this movie. The influences show. I think he did it well, but that is not to everyone’s taste. But what he did is very specific and is not some conspiracy. He went against expectations to make a more interesting story not to subvert the Star Wars universe.

And I’m amazed that some on this forum have taken Kylo’s dialog as a direct intention of the makers of the movie. Kylo is the bad guy and like the previous Star Wars villains before him, he is not a reflection of where things are going, but where they shouldn’t go. They are not out to kill the past and destroy Star Wars. They are not trying to reset the Empire/Rebellion conflict. Remember, the ongoing conflicts are really secondary to the real story of the force. Episode I makes a big deal about the Jedi being weak because the force is out of balance. The OT was busy with Vader and the tyranny of the Empire, but it turned into the story of a son redeeming his father. To end the story, they have to deal with Kylo and Rey and bringing balance to the force again. It helps that I’ve been watching the animated series and how they have been focusing on that balance. So a lot of things that seem important in TFA or TLJ, I think are going to prove after IX comes out. Provided, of course, that Abrams isn’t the one who comes up with the ending. I suspect he isn’t. I expect to eventually find out that the broad brush strokes of the story came from Lucas and they have just changed the details laid on top of that. But that is just speculation. I eagerly await what we will see in about 16 months.

Jay said:

yotsuya said:

Jay said:

Shopping Maul said:

I liked Luke’s vibe in TLJ in theory, but the execution bugged me somewhat. Luke in exile was great. Luke reconsidering past events and pondering (as I have as a fan) the idea of Jedi hubris was great. Luke suggesting that the old Jedi orthodoxy had to die was great. All the stuff about the Force and ‘balance’ and how no-one has a particular claim to it was absolutely great.

What I didn’t like so much was the idea of Luke being on the back foot with all this. Having Yoda come back to give Luke a lecture on ‘failure’ annoyed me. Luke transcended his masters in RoTJ. Yoda and Obi Wan wanted Luke to simply kill the bad guys. Luke chose a more personal, Zen route. I’d prefer he’d been doing the grumpy hobo routine in TLJ as an act - similar to Yoda’s initial test in TESB. This could have been his way of forcing Rey to take her destiny into her own hands, a new and different path away from the usual formalised Jedi training routine. Once Rey had flown off to confront Kylo, Luke could have revealed his cunning duplicity to Yoda and they could’ve burned down the Jedi tree together. Then, after Luke’s great skype-battle with Kylo, Rey could’ve realised what he’d done and be like “you sly devil”.

This way he could’ve played the hobo but still been the Luke we all love and respect without being diminished.

Shopping Maul said:

yotsuya said:

Shopping Maul said:

I liked Luke’s vibe in TLJ in theory, but the execution bugged me somewhat. Luke in exile was great. Luke reconsidering past events and pondering (as I have as a fan) the idea of Jedi hubris was great. Luke suggesting that the old Jedi orthodoxy had to die was great. All the stuff about the Force and ‘balance’ and how no-one has a particular claim to it was absolutely great.

What I didn’t like so much was the idea of Luke being on the back foot with all this. Having Yoda come back to give Luke a lecture on ‘failure’ annoyed me. Luke transcended his masters in RoTJ. Yoda and Obi Wan wanted Luke to simply kill the bad guys. Luke chose a more personal, Zen route. I’d prefer he’d been doing the grumpy hobo routine in TLJ as an act - similar to Yoda’s initial test in TESB. This could have been his way of forcing Rey to take her destiny into her own hands, a new and different path away from the usual formalised Jedi training routine. Once Rey had flown off to confront Kylo, Luke could have revealed his cunning duplicity to Yoda and they could’ve burned down the Jedi tree together. Then, after Luke’s great skype-battle with Kylo, Rey could’ve realised what he’d done and be like “you sly devil”.

This way he could’ve played the hobo but still been the Luke we all love and respect without being diminished.

If you didn’t notice, the scene with Yoda doesn’t alter the more Zen route he took in ROTJ. Yoda isn’t advising him on the force, he is advising him how to teach. Advising him as a fellow master. I think because Luke was so pivotal, Rian didn’t just have him fill the master/mentor role immediately. He brought back some of that negativity that characterized Luke in ANH and TESB. It created a nice character journey for Luke to take him where he needed to be to help Rey.

Yes, but that’s my point - that Luke was brought back to ANH/TESB levels to reboot his arc. Yoda says (in TLJ) “young Skywalker, always looking to the horizon” when it was actually this attitude that saved the day in RoTJ, namely that Luke ‘looked to the horizon’ and took an emotional, idealistic path with regard to the bad guys (as opposed to just killing them).

I just think returning the OT characters to pre-RoTJ status, while not so bad in theory, could’ve been handled better. Leia as rebel leader, rather than Jedi kindergarten teacher, was a no-brainer since her Skywalker heritage was a story convenience that added zero to her character. Han going back to smuggling was kind of dumb - he should have been recruiting pilots from the outer rim or something which would have kept him on his post-RoTJ path while still serving the divorce narrative.

But returning Luke to pre-RoTJ status diminishes RoTJ (and this is coming from someone who doesn’t even like RoTJ!). I think the ‘broken recluse’ idea could have been served in a cleverer way without sending Luke backwards. And he didn’t help Rey. She helped him.

Great interpretations, agree fully. Luke accomplished what his masters couldn’t when he saved his father, and he did it in his own way. Reducing him to a bitter old man who made the same mistakes with his own pupil (except worse, seeing as he considered murder a solution to his failings as a teacher) is to ignore what he accomplished in RotJ. It’s sold as a subversive take on Luke’s character, but it’s really just another reboot and ripoff of a story we’ve already been told.

I didn’t mind the idea of the Jedi Order and its orthodoxy dying out because my interpretation of the prequels has always been that the Jedi became too powerful, influential, and frankly cocky (Yoda speaks to this in AotC I believe), inviting the blindness and corruption that was ultimately the downfall of the Order and the Republic.

Luke experienced an awakening in RotJ and TLJ sets him back for the sake of making Rey look good.

I quite disagree. Luke had faith that his father could be saved and he was right. But seeing the way Luke ended ROTJ as something fundamental had changed with him and he could never fall back to his old defeatist attitude is a false interpretation of the character arc of Luke in the OT. Luke found something to believe in and he believed that the correct course was to rebuild the Jedi. But that failed in a miserable way. It was not just the actions of Luke on that night in Kylo’s hut, but that Kylo had been corrupted to start with and it was too late for Luke to reach him. How did evil penetrate his trailing of his nephew? How could that happen again? Was it in the Skywalker blood? Was it a failing of the Jedi teachings? Why had Kylo fallen? Luke went to the source looking for answers and the only thing he found was that the Jedi were flawed and that flaw had left a hole for Kylo’s fall and while Luke had not caused or been able to prevent it, he had hastened it by listening to his instincts (Ben’s first lesson if you recall - to act on instinct). He had failed his nephew. A tradgedy like that would naturally bring out your defeatist side if that was in your nature (as we saw it was indeed in two movies and still hints of it in ROTJ). It is a very realistic portrayal of a hero and a classic archetype of the former hero as mentor, who has to be convinced to teach. Nothing about the Luke shown in TLJ is contrary to the OT Luke. Quite the reverse. In fact you could say that Luke’s journey in TLJ is very much tied to how his character appeared in ROTJ. Luke is a Jedi of strong emotions. Strong faith and strong doubt.

False interpretation? There’s no such thing. I have my take, you have yours.

As I’ve said multiple times now, I don’t have a problem with Hermit Luke, just the poorly told history that led him to such a place and Rey’s lack of need for any real training to exhibit Force powers that rival Yoda’s. As Shopping Maul said, I have a problem with its execution. I’m just not sold on this version of Luke based on what we’ve been given to work with and I’m not going to perform the mental gymnastics required to get there.

You pose lots of interesting questions, by the way—none of which were answered in TFA or TLJ. I doubt they’ll be answered in IX either.

It is a false interpretation because that is not how human beings are. At their core, all heroes are human beings, just with something special to make them a hero. Hercules had his failings. Luke has his failings. Rian used those to round out Luke’s actions as told in TFA. Luke had a very good day at the end of ROTJ, but on the day Kylo turned against him it was a very bad day. Luke has a bad history with very bad days and there is no reason why having a great day means he will never act the same again on a bad day. That is just ridiculous. Your interpretation builds Luke up to something he is not. That is part of what the story of TLJ is about. Leia and Rey wanted that heroic Luke who took on the Empire, so did a lot of fans. That Luke would be unrealistic. What we got was an epic illusion. He appeared to be the Luke desired, but he was never that Luke. His human side was showing through and he saw no way to help the galaxy except by staying away. Right or wrong, that was his take. In the end he realized the galaxy needed the legend and they got it, just not as they expected it. Better in some ways. But the Luke from the end of ROTJ was still just a Tatooine farm boy at heart. People don’t change in such a fundamental way. That was why Anakin could be saved. He was fundamentally a lost slaveboy who wanted to save his family. Where is that fundamental difference in Kylo. I think his redemption will take a different direction.

DrDre said:

yotsuya said:

DrDre said:

yotsuya said:

Shopping Maul said:

I liked Luke’s vibe in TLJ in theory, but the execution bugged me somewhat. Luke in exile was great. Luke reconsidering past events and pondering (as I have as a fan) the idea of Jedi hubris was great. Luke suggesting that the old Jedi orthodoxy had to die was great. All the stuff about the Force and ‘balance’ and how no-one has a particular claim to it was absolutely great.

What I didn’t like so much was the idea of Luke being on the back foot with all this. Having Yoda come back to give Luke a lecture on ‘failure’ annoyed me. Luke transcended his masters in RoTJ. Yoda and Obi Wan wanted Luke to simply kill the bad guys. Luke chose a more personal, Zen route. I’d prefer he’d been doing the grumpy hobo routine in TLJ as an act - similar to Yoda’s initial test in TESB. This could have been his way of forcing Rey to take her destiny into her own hands, a new and different path away from the usual formalised Jedi training routine. Once Rey had flown off to confront Kylo, Luke could have revealed his cunning duplicity to Yoda and they could’ve burned down the Jedi tree together. Then, after Luke’s great skype-battle with Kylo, Rey could’ve realised what he’d done and be like “you sly devil”.

This way he could’ve played the hobo but still been the Luke we all love and respect without being diminished.

If you didn’t notice, the scene with Yoda doesn’t alter the more Zen route he took in ROTJ. Yoda isn’t advising him on the force, he is advising him how to teach. Advising him as a fellow master. I think because Luke was so pivotal, Rian didn’t just have him fill the master/mentor role immediately. He brought back some of that negativity that characterized Luke in ANH and TESB. It created a nice character journey for Luke to take him where he needed to be to help Rey.

The problem of course is, that he didn’t really help Rey, and that she still succeeded despite this. She helped herself to some books, when she was fed up with him, after which Luke sort of rediscovered himself, and was able to create a diversion for the rebels. Ultimately though he wasn’t much of a mentor in this film, except to be an example of how not to be. Yoda told Luke how to be a better teacher, he got to stage an illusion, and then he died before he could pass on what he had learned.

This is Star Wars. Since when is dying a barrier to being a teacher and mentor?

Ehm, since ANH. Force Ghosts can provide guidance, but up until TLJ they couldn’t physically interact with their environment.

And why does a force ghost need to physically interact to teach? Teaching is mostly words. Everything Ben and Yoda did to teach Luke was with words. They added in a few examples when they were alive, but Luke needed that. All you can say Yoda did was to call down some lightning. Hardly interacting physically with his environment.

Exciting times

yaboykevin01 said:

I found this bit about early changes on this Wookieepedia page.

The earliest edits to the original film occurred between the initial release in May and the wider release later in 1977. The edits are minor, but noticeable. They consist of four changes. All of these changes were made before the foreign language prints were made later in 1977 and well before the last good interpositive was struck in 1985. These four shots run exactly the same length. All of them exist in the earliest bootleg video tapes and in the English 16 mm print. The original three effects shots exist in many home video English language versions released during the 80’s. None of these shots are found in the Definitive Edition, Faces Edition, or 2006 bonus discs, nor are they in any of the known extant 35 mm prints, or Technicolor prints.

• When the Millennium Falcon is being chased after taking off from Mos Eisley, the effects shot where the Star Destroyer is shooting at the Falcon was changed. The early version has different explosions and different flashes and looks less finished.
• When the heroes arrive on Yavin 4, the outdoor composited shot with the matte painting of the temple is recomposited and is not synced the same. It also has an artifact in the image.
• When the fighters take off from Yavin 4, there is an extra cloud and the shot is not synced the same. It also has an artifact in the image.
• The scrolling end credits are completely redone with the spacing, both vertical and horizontal, altered and a glitch in composition at the beginning has been removed.

This is the first I’m hearing of this. The article mentions that these only exist in the earliest bootleg tapes and the English 16mm print. Does Puggo Grande contain the early version shots? If not, where can I obtain this version of the film?

I edited Wookiepedia to include that information. Yes, Puggo Grand has those, as does the Moth3r bookleg. Both also have alternate end credits. All three FX shots and the end credits are flawed. We know that the Definitive Edition (From which the 2006 GOUT discs were struck) was made from a relatively new interpositive of the original prints. Most previous video releases were made from prints. No non-English print has those 4 shots. From the timeline of events in 1977, from the initial release to the wide release and foreign release, we can track back. The various prints that were used for home video that have the three FX shots can easily be prints with the opening crawl and end credits replaced. So we know the shots were replaced at some point after a bunch of prints were struck. It was before the foreign prints. It was before the Technicolor prints. It was before all the prints that have been used in the 35 mm scans. It was after the 16 mm English print was made.

The other clue as to when is that all the prints linked to the mono soundtrack have the newer FX shots. That means, to me, that these must have been from the original release. They would represent the 70 mm version and the first run of the 35 mm. There would have been very few and by the time of the wider release and the foreign release, the FX shots and end credits had been changed. And the rough state of the first FX shot (where the Falcon is leaving Tatooine and the explosions appear to be drawn on rather than composited) seems to confirm that it was a rushed inclusion and the finished shot was dropped in later. The later two shots both have flaws that the replacements don’t.

I’m not sure why they redid the credits entirely when only the transition had a flaw, but the entire end credits are spaced differently, though they run the same length. And for the 1981 re-release with the new crawl, the extant 35 mm copies of the film show that the new crawl was spliced on. So the only known copy that was taken from a print that has the 1981 crawl is the Definitive Edition LD. Though it is possible and even likely that a lot of the prints used for the video transfers had a 1981 first reel. The three changes are on reels 3, 5, and 6.

I actually found out about these changes here on OT. I had never noticed them myself. They aren’t easy to see. But when I found out about them it became very obvious and then I set out to find out when they were changed. The why was obvious as each one had an obvious mistake in it. But the when seems like it has to be between the first small release and the wider release later in 77. It was definitely before the foreign release and the negative in 1992 (or whenever it was struck) contained the changes. Two of the shots were replaced for the SE, but the first one is the same as the DE, confirming that the DE was the current state of the negative at that time.

So again, Puggo Grand and Moth3r have the 3 fX shots and the end credits. The JSC, US SWE, and other English home video releases have the 3 FX shots, but the 1981 opening crawl and the replaced end credits. The DE has none of them. No LD from the foreign market as them (as in non-English).

Jay said:

Shopping Maul said:

I liked Luke’s vibe in TLJ in theory, but the execution bugged me somewhat. Luke in exile was great. Luke reconsidering past events and pondering (as I have as a fan) the idea of Jedi hubris was great. Luke suggesting that the old Jedi orthodoxy had to die was great. All the stuff about the Force and ‘balance’ and how no-one has a particular claim to it was absolutely great.

What I didn’t like so much was the idea of Luke being on the back foot with all this. Having Yoda come back to give Luke a lecture on ‘failure’ annoyed me. Luke transcended his masters in RoTJ. Yoda and Obi Wan wanted Luke to simply kill the bad guys. Luke chose a more personal, Zen route. I’d prefer he’d been doing the grumpy hobo routine in TLJ as an act - similar to Yoda’s initial test in TESB. This could have been his way of forcing Rey to take her destiny into her own hands, a new and different path away from the usual formalised Jedi training routine. Once Rey had flown off to confront Kylo, Luke could have revealed his cunning duplicity to Yoda and they could’ve burned down the Jedi tree together. Then, after Luke’s great skype-battle with Kylo, Rey could’ve realised what he’d done and be like “you sly devil”.

This way he could’ve played the hobo but still been the Luke we all love and respect without being diminished.

Shopping Maul said:

yotsuya said:

Shopping Maul said:

I liked Luke’s vibe in TLJ in theory, but the execution bugged me somewhat. Luke in exile was great. Luke reconsidering past events and pondering (as I have as a fan) the idea of Jedi hubris was great. Luke suggesting that the old Jedi orthodoxy had to die was great. All the stuff about the Force and ‘balance’ and how no-one has a particular claim to it was absolutely great.

What I didn’t like so much was the idea of Luke being on the back foot with all this. Having Yoda come back to give Luke a lecture on ‘failure’ annoyed me. Luke transcended his masters in RoTJ. Yoda and Obi Wan wanted Luke to simply kill the bad guys. Luke chose a more personal, Zen route. I’d prefer he’d been doing the grumpy hobo routine in TLJ as an act - similar to Yoda’s initial test in TESB. This could have been his way of forcing Rey to take her destiny into her own hands, a new and different path away from the usual formalised Jedi training routine. Once Rey had flown off to confront Kylo, Luke could have revealed his cunning duplicity to Yoda and they could’ve burned down the Jedi tree together. Then, after Luke’s great skype-battle with Kylo, Rey could’ve realised what he’d done and be like “you sly devil”.

This way he could’ve played the hobo but still been the Luke we all love and respect without being diminished.

If you didn’t notice, the scene with Yoda doesn’t alter the more Zen route he took in ROTJ. Yoda isn’t advising him on the force, he is advising him how to teach. Advising him as a fellow master. I think because Luke was so pivotal, Rian didn’t just have him fill the master/mentor role immediately. He brought back some of that negativity that characterized Luke in ANH and TESB. It created a nice character journey for Luke to take him where he needed to be to help Rey.

Yes, but that’s my point - that Luke was brought back to ANH/TESB levels to reboot his arc. Yoda says (in TLJ) “young Skywalker, always looking to the horizon” when it was actually this attitude that saved the day in RoTJ, namely that Luke ‘looked to the horizon’ and took an emotional, idealistic path with regard to the bad guys (as opposed to just killing them).

I just think returning the OT characters to pre-RoTJ status, while not so bad in theory, could’ve been handled better. Leia as rebel leader, rather than Jedi kindergarten teacher, was a no-brainer since her Skywalker heritage was a story convenience that added zero to her character. Han going back to smuggling was kind of dumb - he should have been recruiting pilots from the outer rim or something which would have kept him on his post-RoTJ path while still serving the divorce narrative.

But returning Luke to pre-RoTJ status diminishes RoTJ (and this is coming from someone who doesn’t even like RoTJ!). I think the ‘broken recluse’ idea could have been served in a cleverer way without sending Luke backwards. And he didn’t help Rey. She helped him.

Great interpretations, agree fully. Luke accomplished what his masters couldn’t when he saved his father, and he did it in his own way. Reducing him to a bitter old man who made the same mistakes with his own pupil (except worse, seeing as he considered murder a solution to his failings as a teacher) is to ignore what he accomplished in RotJ. It’s sold as a subversive take on Luke’s character, but it’s really just another reboot and ripoff of a story we’ve already been told.

I didn’t mind the idea of the Jedi Order and its orthodoxy dying out because my interpretation of the prequels has always been that the Jedi became too powerful, influential, and frankly cocky (Yoda speaks to this in AotC I believe), inviting the blindness and corruption that was ultimately the downfall of the Order and the Republic.

Luke experienced an awakening in RotJ and TLJ sets him back for the sake of making Rey look good.

I quite disagree. Luke had faith that his father could be saved and he was right. But seeing the way Luke ended ROTJ as something fundamental had changed with him and he could never fall back to his old defeatist attitude is a false interpretation of the character arc of Luke in the OT. Luke found something to believe in and he believed that the correct course was to rebuild the Jedi. But that failed in a miserable way. It was not just the actions of Luke on that night in Kylo’s hut, but that Kylo had been corrupted to start with and it was too late for Luke to reach him. How did evil penetrate his trailing of his nephew? How could that happen again? Was it in the Skywalker blood? Was it a failing of the Jedi teachings? Why had Kylo fallen? Luke went to the source looking for answers and the only thing he found was that the Jedi were flawed and that flaw had left a hole for Kylo’s fall and while Luke had not caused or been able to prevent it, he had hastened it by listening to his instincts (Ben’s first lesson if you recall - to act on instinct). He had failed his nephew. A tradgedy like that would naturally bring out your defeatist side if that was in your nature (as we saw it was indeed in two movies and still hints of it in ROTJ). It is a very realistic portrayal of a hero and a classic archetype of the former hero as mentor, who has to be convinced to teach. Nothing about the Luke shown in TLJ is contrary to the OT Luke. Quite the reverse. In fact you could say that Luke’s journey in TLJ is very much tied to how his character appeared in ROTJ. Luke is a Jedi of strong emotions. Strong faith and strong doubt.

DrDre said:

yotsuya said:

Shopping Maul said:

I liked Luke’s vibe in TLJ in theory, but the execution bugged me somewhat. Luke in exile was great. Luke reconsidering past events and pondering (as I have as a fan) the idea of Jedi hubris was great. Luke suggesting that the old Jedi orthodoxy had to die was great. All the stuff about the Force and ‘balance’ and how no-one has a particular claim to it was absolutely great.

What I didn’t like so much was the idea of Luke being on the back foot with all this. Having Yoda come back to give Luke a lecture on ‘failure’ annoyed me. Luke transcended his masters in RoTJ. Yoda and Obi Wan wanted Luke to simply kill the bad guys. Luke chose a more personal, Zen route. I’d prefer he’d been doing the grumpy hobo routine in TLJ as an act - similar to Yoda’s initial test in TESB. This could have been his way of forcing Rey to take her destiny into her own hands, a new and different path away from the usual formalised Jedi training routine. Once Rey had flown off to confront Kylo, Luke could have revealed his cunning duplicity to Yoda and they could’ve burned down the Jedi tree together. Then, after Luke’s great skype-battle with Kylo, Rey could’ve realised what he’d done and be like “you sly devil”.

This way he could’ve played the hobo but still been the Luke we all love and respect without being diminished.

If you didn’t notice, the scene with Yoda doesn’t alter the more Zen route he took in ROTJ. Yoda isn’t advising him on the force, he is advising him how to teach. Advising him as a fellow master. I think because Luke was so pivotal, Rian didn’t just have him fill the master/mentor role immediately. He brought back some of that negativity that characterized Luke in ANH and TESB. It created a nice character journey for Luke to take him where he needed to be to help Rey.

The problem of course is, that he didn’t really help Rey, and that she still succeeded despite this. She helped herself to some books, when she was fed up with him, after which Luke sort of rediscovered himself, and was able to create a diversion for the rebels. Ultimately though he wasn’t much of a mentor in this film, except to be an example of how not to be. Yoda told Luke how to be a better teacher, he got to stage an illusion, and then he died before he could pass on what he had learned.

This is Star Wars. Since when is dying a barrier to being a teacher and mentor?

Shopping Maul said:

I liked Luke’s vibe in TLJ in theory, but the execution bugged me somewhat. Luke in exile was great. Luke reconsidering past events and pondering (as I have as a fan) the idea of Jedi hubris was great. Luke suggesting that the old Jedi orthodoxy had to die was great. All the stuff about the Force and ‘balance’ and how no-one has a particular claim to it was absolutely great.

What I didn’t like so much was the idea of Luke being on the back foot with all this. Having Yoda come back to give Luke a lecture on ‘failure’ annoyed me. Luke transcended his masters in RoTJ. Yoda and Obi Wan wanted Luke to simply kill the bad guys. Luke chose a more personal, Zen route. I’d prefer he’d been doing the grumpy hobo routine in TLJ as an act - similar to Yoda’s initial test in TESB. This could have been his way of forcing Rey to take her destiny into her own hands, a new and different path away from the usual formalised Jedi training routine. Once Rey had flown off to confront Kylo, Luke could have revealed his cunning duplicity to Yoda and they could’ve burned down the Jedi tree together. Then, after Luke’s great skype-battle with Kylo, Rey could’ve realised what he’d done and be like “you sly devil”.

This way he could’ve played the hobo but still been the Luke we all love and respect without being diminished.

If you didn’t notice, the scene with Yoda doesn’t alter the more Zen route he took in ROTJ. Yoda isn’t advising him on the force, he is advising him how to teach. Advising him as a fellow master. I think because Luke was so pivotal, Rian didn’t just have him fill the master/mentor role immediately. He brought back some of that negativity that characterized Luke in ANH and TESB. It created a nice character journey for Luke to take him where he needed to be to help Rey.

The two things I always expected from a sequel were that Luke would be the mentor not the hero, and Han would die. Lucas and Hamill have repeatedly said the exact same thing for Luke’s role in the sequels and JJ and Rian and delivered on both those. I think JJ did a great job of giving us a new cast of characters. I think Rian gave us a fantastic middle chapter. He put all the characters through the ringer and put them in placed where they are poised for so much more that is barely hinted at. What we really have in a Star Wars trilogy is a 9 act play. Each movie is in 3 acts and the trilogy is 3 movies. So each movie acts as an act in the trilogy. Each first movie sets up the scenario, the second movie makes things worse for the characters, and the last movie resolves the story. Ep III did not resolve it in a good way, making the prequels a tragedy. Ep VI ended on a very high note and the only way JJ can pull this off is if Ep IX ends on an even higher note. I think it might even need an epilogue.

But outside of all that, Lucas never shared what his sequel vision was. Just that Luke would be mentor and hand off to a new generation. Lucas gave us a female Jedi and Luke in self-imposed exile. And that is just from art he commissioned before selling his studio to Disney. That JJ used that I think is a hint that more of what they have done might be from the treatment of the sequel than they are letting on. That is the only hope I have that the ending could be good. JJ rewrote the first part to put Luke at the end and I think that probably damaged the story. I can imagine Lucas writing the very sendoff we got in TLJ for Luke in VII. Instead Kylo kills Han. That in itself breaks the parallels with the OT and PT (the big death in both first episodes was the Jedi mentor and while Han is kind of a mentor, he is not a Jedi). But I really think that if they are following a blueprint that IX will pull things together. I think it will reveal things about TFA and TLJ that we haven’t noticed. That is certainly true of the OT (though some of that is Lucas changing the story, but I’m still in awe of Ben’s expression when he starts to tell Luke of his father - it’s like Lucas told Guinness that he wasn’t telling Luke the whole truth). I think some things are going to be very obvious when we know how the story ends. At least that is my hope. JJ hasn’t been known for being so proactive, but you never know. He does love Star Wars.

I think expectations is the biggest reason people have for not liking either of these movies or the sequels in general. This story is continuing with the characters we left in ROTJ. What they do with them has great meaning. I would even bet the Lucas decided it was time but also decided that he didn’t want to to be one to get the blame this time. The reaction to the prequels was bad enough. But Hamill, Ford, and Fisher were the right age. I’m not sure how many were surprised that Han died. I wasn’t. I was expecting it. That it seems to be a pivotal part of Kylo’s story is just a bonus. How that plays out we have to wait for over a year. Luke’s death didn’t really surprise me either. He is the mentor passing the torch. Dying and becoming a ghost is a bonus that myths offer. The sequels have managed to tap into those mythic archtypes very well, but they just haven’t been the ones people wanted to see.

I have constantly had the feeling that most wanted to see the hero Luke at it again rather than a mentor Luke. But the mentor has to move out of the way for the new hero, in this case Rey. In each trilogy, the hero has unique abilities. In the OT Luke had a blinding faith that his father could be redeemed. His attitude in ANH is renewed in ROTJ after he knows who is father really is. In the PT, Anakin is gifted and appears to be the chosen one. What the means is a little foggy and we don’t know if Palpatine derailed the prophesy or just delayed it. Lucas has said Anakin’s return to the light and eliminating Palpatine brought balance to the force, but that isn’t as clear in the story (a story that wasn’t written to reflect the later prequels). So I’m hoping the force side of the sequels is finding a balance in the force going forward. I watched Clone Wars and Rebels and the force stories in there all align with the direction of TFA in terms of Balance. Tom Baker’s character of Bendu has been very enlightening. The OT had the last Jedi defeat the last Sith, the PT gave us a prophesy for Balance, Clone Wars and Rebels have given us insight into what that could mean, and I hope the ST will tackle it head on in the final chapter.

I guess I’m kind of doing what I am blasting others for. I am setting up expectations for IX. But I do temper my expectations based the need for film makers to exert creativity in each project. Lucas changed his vision (as much as he denies it) from movie to movie as can be clearly seen in the progression from IV, to V, to VI, to III. What matters to me on the day that I see IX is if it had a compelling story and a solid ending. With JJ directing, I have serious worried about the ending and only have hope with the underlying story that seems to come from Lucasfilm (as echoed in TCW and Rebels).

Yeah, Puggo Strikes Back is pretty close to what I arrived at. A lot bluer than I originally imagined.

NeverarGreat said:

yotsuya said:

Frankly the idea that they reset it makes no sense with IX being the saga finale. No sense at all.

For almost 40 years, movie three of the OT was the end of the Star Wars saga. You know, the movie where all the major villains were killed and everyone assumed that the Rebellion had won, and which in TFA’s backstory it actually had. George’s idea for sequel trilogies was constantly changing, and was at times going to be about the Wookiee planet, or the world of the Midichlorians, or about Luke finding his mysterious twin sister across the galaxy and requiring her to defeat the Emperor, at least before he got tired of Star Wars and rushed to the conclusion in ROTJ. Why are we taking George’s plans seriously at all anymore?

So yes, George Lucas and JJ Abrams and Michael Arndt reset the conflict in the universe for another trilogy. To draw a comparison: Mordor is again filled with bigger, meaner orcs with another evil spirit leading them, Aragorn has given up on the world of Men and gone into hiding, and another hobbit hero will need to find a wizard mentor and make everything right with the world. Again.

And it’s just a shame, since the seeds of greatness are within TFA from the beginning. A Republic split between a strong, centralized ‘Imperial’ government and a united confederation of self-ruled star systems would provide ample opportunity for conflict. Add to this the questioning of bringing back what is essentially a state-sanctioned theocratic order, and the rehabilitation of generations of soldiers conditioned for war, and you’ve got the beginning of a truly new chapter in what can really call itself the continuing Star Wars saga. And it actually is that sort of a movie, until the Senate is blown up by another superweapon and the Resistance becomes the Rebellion.

Finally, I’m somewhat amused at how much faith you put in a man who is famed for his inability to stick the landing of his stories, when he has to do it now not just for this trilogy, but for the entire Star Wars saga.
I don’t envy him his job.

I have no faith what so ever that Abrams can craft an ending to this trilogy much less the saga. But George did a treatment with an ending. We know they are using his treatment as the basis for at least some of the story. If they use George’s ending, I’m confident that Abrams can pull it off because he is a good director, just not a good writer. I do worry he will muck it up in editing like he did TFA.

And I do think this saga will end and not be picked up again. Disney has plans to explore more corners of the Star Wars galaxy. There are thousands of years of the past to delve into. Lots of good Jedi/Sith stuff, lots of good wars and conflicts. They have plans for two trilogies that are not connected to the Skywalker saga.

DrDre said:

yotsuya said:

Movies show us some things and tell us others to paint the picture of the galaxy. The crawl is part of that. You cant take what the movies show and ignore what they tell and you can’t take what they tell and ignore what they show. Both parts go together to give us the setting and setup. The TFA crawl sets up the situation, just like the ANH crawl setup that situation. Both make it clear which side is wide spread and which side is fighting. In ANH, there are but two sides, the Empire and the Rebellion. In TFA there is the new Republic, the First Order, and the Resistance. The FO decapitates the Republic but has taken no action to invade. When are they doing that? Well, that so called throw away line from Rey where she says weeks. The way you guys are describing it, the First Order, just by destroying the Republic capital and fleet has taken over every planet in the Republic and that is very silly.

As for Starkiller base, just how many people were there? We don’t know. It obviously wasn’t the heart of the First Order. Snoke wasn’t there. So yeah, a lot of investment was destroyed, but their fleet wasn’t nor was their home base. And we still don’t know where that is.

How you are reading this nonsense into two movies that very clearly are giving us as much data as the OT ever did and which OT fans have pulled out and poured over for decades is beyond me. I know you have issues with the movie(s), but you are going to extreme lengths to make points that are inaccurate and do not fit what we are shown and told. I was going to extreme lengths to show that there is a much different story from the one you think these movies are telling. You are only pointing out things that fit your point of view rather than taking everything into account. Stop blaming the story telling that is perfectly in line with the previous 6 films (and a lot of it seems to original with GL himself) and just admit you don’t like things about it. You don’t need long detailed reasons. My reasons for hating certain Star Trek movies are very plain, simple, and I don’t try to rip apart every aspect of the films. I know what I don’t like and what ruins it for me. Abrams bad editing and poor science (it is Star Wars, but GL was always pretty good about making things seem reasonable while Abrams just pulled a Bruckheimer as far as I’m concerned) are why I dislike TFA. Though to me honest, it might also have something to do with seeing it in 3D and hating the 3D effect that made it look so fake. I’m waiting until IX to really delve into it in detail. But saying this is a reset and rehash of the OT fails to account for the goal of a finale in the form of IX. You see a reset, I see a setup. I see things moving toward an ending. Frankly the idea that they reset it makes no sense with IX being the saga finale. No sense at all.

What are you talking about? I’ve admitted I don’t like things about the movie ad nauseum, as many here will profess. There are differences in the story, but you don’t have to be a genius to notice the obvious visual and narrative simularities between the the OT and the ST. TFA has been widely criticized for this. TFA is a hommage to ANH. TLJ appears to follow suit, but uses several story twists to keep the audience on their toes. Someone else noted this yesterday, but the problem with this is, that once the novelty of the twists wear off, the narrative similarities between TLJ, and TESB/ROTJ become more obvious, leading to a continuous sense of déja vu while watching the movie just like for TFA, even if the outcome of events is different. A perfect example for this is the throne room sequence, which delibirately recycles the throne room sequence of ROTJ, with Rey having the same motivations as Luke, and even repeats some of the same dialogue, but then introduces a big twist to change the dynamic of the story. TFA left RJ with the difficult job of continuing a highly derivative story. He decided to use our expectations against us, and created a story that seems to rehash large chunks of TESB and ROTJ, but uses twists and turns to get us to a very different conclusion. Episode IX may be totally unique and different. I certainly hope so, but even if that turns out to be the case, we had to watch two highly self-referential, and derivative films to get there, and that’s a shame from a certain point of view. In my view it should not take two highly derivative movies to setup what might become a mostly original story for episode IX.

What I’m talking about is that so many who claim similarities are focusing solely on the similarities in your complaints and ignoring the differences. You can do the exact same thing with the PT. Exactly. The echoes in story telling were deliberate on Lucas’s part. It is the differences that are important. And in some of the similarities you point out, you have to really force it to make it sound the same.

Movies show us some things and tell us others to paint the picture of the galaxy. The crawl is part of that. You cant take what the movies show and ignore what they tell and you can’t take what they tell and ignore what they show. Both parts go together to give us the setting and setup. The TFA crawl sets up the situation, just like the ANH crawl setup that situation. Both make it clear which side is wide spread and which side is fighting. In ANH, there are but two sides, the Empire and the Rebellion. In TFA there is the new Republic, the First Order, and the Resistance. The FO decapitates the Republic but has taken no action to invade. When are they doing that? Well, that so called throw away line from Rey where she says weeks. The way you guys are describing it, the First Order, just by destroying the Republic capital and fleet has taken over every planet in the Republic and that is very silly.

As for Starkiller base, just how many people were there? We don’t know. It obviously wasn’t the heart of the First Order. Snoke wasn’t there. So yeah, a lot of investment was destroyed, but their fleet wasn’t nor was their home base. And we still don’t know where that is.

How you are reading this nonsense into two movies that very clearly are giving us as much data as the OT ever did and which OT fans have pulled out and poured over for decades is beyond me. I know you have issues with the movie(s), but you are going to extreme lengths to make points that are inaccurate and do not fit what we are shown and told. I was going to extreme lengths to show that there is a much different story from the one you think these movies are telling. You are only pointing out things that fit your point of view rather than taking everything into account. Stop blaming the story telling that is perfectly in line with the previous 6 films (and a lot of it seems to original with GL himself) and just admit you don’t like things about it. You don’t need long detailed reasons. My reasons for hating certain Star Trek movies are very plain, simple, and I don’t try to rip apart every aspect of the films. I know what I don’t like and what ruins it for me. Abrams bad editing and poor science (it is Star Wars, but GL was always pretty good about making things seem reasonable while Abrams just pulled a Bruckheimer as far as I’m concerned) are why I dislike TFA. Though to me honest, it might also have something to do with seeing it in 3D and hating the 3D effect that made it look so fake. I’m waiting until IX to really delve into it in detail. But saying this is a reset and rehash of the OT fails to account for the goal of a finale in the form of IX. You see a reset, I see a setup. I see things moving toward an ending. Frankly the idea that they reset it makes no sense with IX being the saga finale. No sense at all.

NeverarGreat said:

One minor point as I rewatch the movie - Finn and Rose are able to escape the Raddus undetected by either party and go to another planet. Since Holdo’s plan is to rely on reinforcements from the Outer Rim after boosting the signal from Crait, why couldn’t a few Resistance soldiers have taken that cloaked hyperspace ship and gone to Crait ahead of the Raddus? Or have been ferrying people off the Raddus onto Crait for hours, preventing a situation where all of the Resistance’s eggs are in one basket?

Frink would say I’m trying to dislike this movie.
But I like nitpicking the plot.

Good point, but one that can be made for wide variety of historical incidents so it’s not really an issue. They did what they thought of at the time.

The only thing I have to say is that I think the GOUT is the key to finding out what TESB is supposed to look like. When I found a nice color correction for ANH and applied those settings to ROTJ, it came out very close to the grindhouse ROTJ scan. So I’m assuming that if you have a correction for ANH that works for ROTJ, that using that on the GOUT for TESB will get you something close to the real colors. Enough to guide a shot by shot regrade and possibly provide a basic correction that works for most scenes.

mfastx said:

Collipso said:
let’s play with some keywords here and see what we get:

“I would have much more enjoyed a story of how Anakin got seduced by The Emperor, how the Empire came to be, etc.”

sounds familiar?

That just further proves my point that the new story we’re getting is essentially the same exact thing as what’s already happened. Given the story we got, I would have rather they started from the beginning and tell it properly. One key unexplained element is Snoke, who is a neat, totally new character, except that he has no explanation or backstory and then is killed off. It’s important to flesh out his character because he isn’t relevant at all in the already established OT.

TV’s Frink said:
I can understand not liking what you got but how is that “nonsensical?”

There’s many reasons explained by others above, but basically all of the major, universe altering plot points that happen with no explanation given what’s established in the OT. They just waived their hand with major plot elements (New Republic all of the sudden completely destroyed (it was just one planet system?) by the new mysterious superweapon, ALL of Luke’s new crop of Jedi destroyed by Ben, etc.) just so they could have Rebels vs. Empire again.

Except that we don’t have the Rebels vs. Empire again. Not really. They are indeed going for that feel, but in the OT we had a galaxy spanning empire and a scattered rebellion. In the ST we have a beheaded Republic, a cut down resistance, both in opposition to the invading First Order. So unlike the OT where the government of nearly every world is against you (because they are controlled by the Empire), now there are allies everywhere, and the Resistance can work to unite the planets trying to resist the First Order take over. While the fighting parties are very similar to what we see in the OT, in the OT that was one fleet of a much larger navy and in the ST, we can’t be sure how much larger the navy is than what we see (and in TLJ a lot of the FO ships were destroyed or badly damaged). So on the surface your argument seems to make sense, but when the full situation is laid out, the comparison falls flat as there are too many differences and too many ways the story can go that can be completely different in the third act.

DrDre said:

yotsuya said:

mfastx said:

DrDre said:
I agree. The PT ends where the OT begins, right down to the twin sunset on Tatooine. Going from ROTJ to TFA is far more jarring to me, where an obvious total victory is suddenly and without explanation completely reversed, while all the victors have become shadows of their former selves. General Solo has again become a smuggler in debt with everyone, who hides from his problems. Luke’s hiding from his problems on a rock, and has closed himself off from the Force. Even Leia has been demoted from princess, and senator to the general of an even smaller band of rebels, whilst Han and Leia have apparently won the worst parents of the year award.

This is my main issue with the ST. Despite the fact that they’re very good films, the story is just so nonsensical to me. What we’re told happened between VI and VII is far more interesting to me than what’s happening in VII and VIII. We’re right back where we started in the OT (if not worse, the rebels are down to a handful of folk on the falcon), with no real explanation as to how we got there after the triumphant victory in VI.

I would have much more enjoyed a story of how Ben got seduced by Snoke, how the First Order came to be, etc.

Many who don’t like it see things back where the OT began, but it isn’t. That is my point. While there are echoes of the OT in the ST (there were in the PT as well), the ST is telling a unique story that I don’t think we will totally see until the third story is out for us to follow the plots. In TLJ, the First Order has not yet taken over. Rey says it directly. While the Republic government and fleet have been wiped out, the First Order still has to actually seize power. They have only eliminated the other power that Snoke thought could stop him.

I disagree. The New Republic in TFA doesn’t play any role of significance, and by the start of TLJ it’s been written out of the story altogether. The destruction of Hosnian Prime is equivalent to the destruction of Alderaan, only bigger. The fact that the FO actually has to seize power also does not translate to the films, since the FO are behaving just like the Empire throughout both TFA and TLJ. There’s very little in the films, that suggest the FO are a rising power, a reality made all the more clear by the fact, that the destruction of the SKB doesn’t affect them in any way.

We are no in the same place at the end of TLJ that we were at the beginning of ANH. It is a must different landscape. For one thing, there were no Jedi on the Galactic stage in ANH. There is Luke and Rey in TLJ and Luke has just left a lasting impression to give power to the new rebellion. Please find that in the years leading up to ANH. Even Rebels doesn’t have such a public display of power, and definitely not one that spread like wildfire across the galaxy.

What public display of power? Luke made a symbolic act, only seen by a handful of rebels, and a legion of FO troops. The fact that people are inspired by this, is a good way to end the story on a note of hope, but considering that the rebels have been reduced to a dozen people on a single ship, I don’t see that as some great victory. I would consider the destruction of the first Death Star as being a far greater victory in both a military and symbolic sense. I would think the destruction of SKB, the FO’s home base, and their most powerful weapon should be much more important in a military, and symbolic sense, but RJ certainly turned that into a pretty hollow victory, considering TLJ’s events follow directly from TFA, and the fact that the FO were supposed to be a rising power. I predict, that the FO will have a firm grasp on the galaxy by the start of episode IX, whilst the rebels will still be struggling to survive. The fact that they survived at all, is to Luke’s credit, but considering he played a major role in getting the galaxy to this dark place, I again would not see it as a huge victory.

The mere existence of the Resistance and Leia’s role as its leader tells us that the new Republic is not what she had hoped and that she fears they do not take the First Order seriously. It paints a picture of a complacent Republic that is probably more worried about internal squabbles than a theoretical outside threat. That they had so few ships that the entire fleet was in orbit of the capital shows that it it was a very weak republic.

Yes, but in the service of rehashing the Empire versus rebels conflict of the OT. The only reason the New Republic is so complacent and weak, is because the writers of the ST desperately wanted to reset the Star Wars galaxy to a pre-BFE state, including a rebellion, stormtroopers, an Emperor figure, and a fallen Jedi student.

I seriously don’t get what some of you want. Do you want a sequel trilogy with a story or a pointless story set in a perfect Utopia? To get a story you have to have conflict and the easiest way to get it is for things to go wrong. In the ST we are getting, things went wrong about 15-20 years after ROTJ (and ROTJ wasn’t the last battle). That is 15-20 years when things went right. The Republic was flourishing and Han and Leia were together. And the worst part is you are blaming Kennedy, and Johnson and leaving out Lucas and Abrams. This whole ST is Lucas’s doing. He created a treatment, he sold his company, he turned it over to Kennedy. How much of his treatment they are using is unknown, but they are using his girl force sensitive hero and his exiled Luke and I bet there is a lot more they are using. But let’s sit tight and wait for IX before we write off the ST. We can’t even tell what the main story is, just like the redemption of Anakin/Vader didn’t become part of the story until ROTJ. In the PT, we all knew where it would end up so we knew the arc from the moment we heard the name Anakin.

I didn’t want two movies, that essentially remix the OT. I didn’t want Empire versus rebels 2.0 right down to the stormtroopers, x-wings, tie-fighters, and a Death Star. I didn’t want an another Jedi apprentice seduced by a Sith Lord wannabe. Been there, done that! What I wanted was an original story with original villains, and a completely different setup, that follows naturally from the events of ROTJ. I’m aware that’s a lot to ask for, but when it comes to Star Wars I have high expectations. I think TFA and TLJ are both pretty good films seen in a vaccuum, but as sequels to the OT, they’re a dissappointment to me.

But it is not a total rehash. Since you are focused on the Jedi/Sith part, in the PT you have Palpatine, a hidden sith lord, lose one apprentice, gain Dooku, all the while his aim is to turn Skywalker (the PT makes it very clear that Palpatine has been Anakin’s mentor from TPM on). In the OT, Palpatine has Vader. When they learn of Luke, they set the goal to turn him. When Luke finally comes before Palpatine, Palpatine no only tries to turn him, but tries to replace Vader. In the ST, Snoke has turned Ben/Kylo. Or has he. There is conflict an in order to end that conflict, Kylo kills his father only to find that conflict has grown not gone away. Snoke sees it and while Kylo tries to turn Rey, Snoke really doesn’t bother, instead having Kylo kill Rey. But that conflict has turned to resolve, not to destroy Rey, but to kill Snoke. And how the story plays out from there we don’t know. So from the Jedi/Sith/Whatever perspective, the three trilogies are completely different. In both the PT and the OT, the Jedi tale is much the same. Boy meets mentor, mentor dies, mentor arranges for another teacher. Boy is taught and becomes a Jedi. The third act for the PT and OT differ as one has the boy fall and the other has the boy redeem his father by sacrificing his life. The ST has a girl search for a mentor (the PT and OT didn’t have a search as the mentor just happened to find the boy), find him, have him refuse to teach her, relent and give some lessons. But then the girl leaves to learn on her own and the mentor dies and will train her from the grave. A couple of points are the same, but the rest is very very different in the ST.

And we don’t have an all powerful, galaxy wide empire. We have a power on the Rim invading the core. Their first strike was the PT equivalent of destroying the Coruscant system (not Alderaan) and decapitating the fledgling Republic. Nothing in TLJ says that the FO have actually conquered anything yet. Rey says it will happen in weeks. Only hours or days have passed since the end of TFA. So the FO is in the position of the invader, not the local power. They are more like the Separatists in the Clone Wars. They are not the nearly all powerful Empire of the OT. They are the aggressors where in the OT the Rebels are the aggressors trying to unseat the tyrannical power.

You keep focusing on some small points of similarity and saying it is the same, yet when you dig in to the details they are not. I am really finding the nature of this argument to be very much like the arguments against the PT (why is Anakin a boy, why all the politics, etc., etc., etc.), the only difference is the quality of the finished product - at least to some. I really can’t see the substance of all the TLJ hate. Most was setup in TFA and TLJ just carries on the story. And the story appears to be close to GL’s treatment (definitely the Luke arc), but with characters created by Abrams (one thing he is very good at).

mfastx said:

DrDre said:
I agree. The PT ends where the OT begins, right down to the twin sunset on Tatooine. Going from ROTJ to TFA is far more jarring to me, where an obvious total victory is suddenly and without explanation completely reversed, while all the victors have become shadows of their former selves. General Solo has again become a smuggler in debt with everyone, who hides from his problems. Luke’s hiding from his problems on a rock, and has closed himself off from the Force. Even Leia has been demoted from princess, and senator to the general of an even smaller band of rebels, whilst Han and Leia have apparently won the worst parents of the year award.

This is my main issue with the ST. Despite the fact that they’re very good films, the story is just so nonsensical to me. What we’re told happened between VI and VII is far more interesting to me than what’s happening in VII and VIII. We’re right back where we started in the OT (if not worse, the rebels are down to a handful of folk on the falcon), with no real explanation as to how we got there after the triumphant victory in VI.

I would have much more enjoyed a story of how Ben got seduced by Snoke, how the First Order came to be, etc.

Many who don’t like it see things back where the OT began, but it isn’t. That is my point. While there are echoes of the OT in the ST (there were in the PT as well), the ST is telling a unique story that I don’t think we will totally see until the third story is out for us to follow the plots. In TLJ, the First Order has not yet taken over. Rey says it directly. While the Republic government and fleet have been wiped out, the First Order still has to actually seize power. They have only eliminated the other power that Snoke thought could stop him. We are no in the same place at the end of TLJ that we were at the beginning of ANH. It is a must different landscape. For one thing, there were no Jedi on the Galactic stage in ANH. There is Luke and Rey in TLJ and Luke has just left a lasting impression to give power to the new rebellion. Please find that in the years leading up to ANH. Even Rebels doesn’t have such a public display of power, and definitely not one that spread like wildfire across the galaxy.

The mere existence of the Resistance and Leia’s role as its leader tells us that the new Republic is not what she had hoped and that she fears they do not take the First Order seriously. It paints a picture of a complacent Republic that is probably more worried about internal squabbles than a theoretical outside threat. That they had so few ships that the entire fleet was in orbit of the capital shows that it it was a very weak republic.

And I’ve seen several comments about continuing the OT the way George would do it, and guess what, they are. The basic plot elements, some of the very ones people are complaining the most about, were penned by George. They created their own cast of characters, but the broad arc of the trilogy seems to be following George’s treatment. Luke’s exile is the single item we can point to with absolutely certainty as coming directly from George himself, but the broad arcs fit with that. As does Luke now being the mentor as Ben was in the OT. The fact that George had an idea for a sequel and that it went so far as a treatment means he had conflict. It means he is the one who decided to derail the happy ending many imagine for post ROTJ. He seems to have given them a decade or two before ruining things for them Han and Leia have a son, there is a new Republic, but you can’t have the next chapter of a saga if things are all still rosy.

I seriously don’t get what some of you want. Do you want a sequel trilogy with a story or a pointless story set in a perfect Utopia? To get a story you have to have conflict and the easiest way to get it is for things to go wrong. In the ST we are getting, things went wrong about 15-20 years after ROTJ (and ROTJ wasn’t the last battle). That is 15-20 years when things went right. The Republic was flourishing and Han and Leia were together. And the worst part is you are blaming Kennedy, and Johnson and leaving out Lucas and Abrams. This whole ST is Lucas’s doing. He created a treatment, he sold his company, he turned it over to Kennedy. How much of his treatment they are using is unknown, but they are using his girl force sensitive hero and his exiled Luke and I bet there is a lot more they are using. But let’s sit tight and wait for IX before we write off the ST. We can’t even tell what the main story is, just like the redemption of Anakin/Vader didn’t become part of the story until ROTJ. In the PT, we all knew where it would end up so we knew the arc from the moment we heard the name Anakin.

DrDre said:

yotsuya said:

DrDre said:

yotsuya said:

DrDre said:

yotsuya said:

Collipso said:

i’m only one minute in and he’s already bashing everyone that doesn’t like the movie and saying that we don’t like it simply because our theories were wrong. that’s simply not true, i liked rey being a nobody, but i wish we had more information on Snoke to help bridge the 30 year gap and how we went from ‘RIP the empire’ to ‘RIP the rebels’ with a new extremely powerful emperor. we’re two movies in already and we have no idea why the galaxy is in the state it’s in, and Snoke’s “backstory” could help with that.

What what exactly was Palpatine’s backstory before the prequels? What exactly is his backstory in the prequels? That we don’t get information on Snoke is not exactly something new.

Palpatine wasn’t someone of influence until the prequels, and we got to witness him dismantle the Republic throughout the PT in great detail. With Snoke it’s sort of an afterthought. The guy undid everything our heroes fought for somehow, but that’s not considered to be of importance, apparently. It appears to me, that what mattered most is giving us a redux of the OT conflict, and the OT aesthetic with different characters.

That isn’t an accurate assessment of the galactic situation. It is clear from the setup in TFA that the Republic is not very strong and that the great Republic of old has not been recreated. So what our heroes were fighting for in the OT has never been finished. If you look at history this is what often happens. The first government formed after a revolution doesn’t last. Usually it falls and is replaced with something else until that falls and something stronger rises in its place. All we have on the First Order is they rose from the ashes of the Empire. Clearly the production is an indication that Snoke ended up in control of an old Imperial shipyard. Who Snoke is makes little difference to the overall story. That he was there at the right time and place to create the First Order is all that matters. The rest is just filler.

That he was there “at the right time” is contrived, and diminishes the entire story arc of the OT imo. The writers just pushed the reset button and pulled another “Sith Lord” out of thin air to get us right back at the start of ANH. The New Republic is a token effort, just like stating that Kylo Ren and Snoke are not Sith Lords. The New Republic is just there to be blown away, and never seen again, such that the Resistance can become the rebels, and the FO the Empire, whilst Kylo Ren and Snoke are completely indistuinguishable from their Sith counterparts. Lucas spent an entire trilogy exploring how a democracy got turned into an Empire, whilst setting up the rivalry between the Jedi and the Sith, and showing how a young Jedi turns into a Sith Lord. The ST gives us very little context, and makes very little effort to show us how and why we’re right back at square one after two trilogies of seeing an Empire rise and fall. Meanwhile Kylo Ren is just evil, because he’s a bad egg, I guess. He’s given zero motivation for turning to the dark side. Snoke had won his heart is all we get, and Luke apparently pushed him over the edge, because that’s what Jedi do, when you need another Darth Vader.

While the story works fairly well seen on its own terms, in my view it simply doesn’t flow very well from the first six films, and clearly isn’t very original, in that it recycles an awful lot from the OT both visually and narratively. The fact that so many things are left unexplained, and unexplored only reinforces this. Snoke is thus just another Emperor redux like so many other things the ST “borrowed” from the OT. This is the real issue here. By giving Snoke an original backstory, and by making him distuinguishable from the Sith Lords that proceeded him the entire events of the ST are elevated, because it adds history and context, thus allowing the Star Wars universe and mythology to grow beyond simply rehashing what Lucas and his contemporaries did better some four decades earlier.

After six films of stories and events just plunging us into another OT inspired conflict with little context to connect the dots is not going to work for many people, because they are already too invested in the universe, and the characters. Saying Snoke is used not very differently from the Emperor in the OT, is not a defense, but an admission of guilt, because it ignores the fact, that we have had fourty years of story developments, and world building since that time. If the OT’s resolution is important, then how that happy ending got unraveled is as well. To say, that it doesn’t really matter how Snoke and the FO got to undermine the New Republic, and why the New Republic allowed itself to be overrun, is to say that the OT’s resolutions aren’t very important, because another Sith Lord can be pulled from behind the curtain to undo it anyway to extend the conflict ad nauseam. By extension this also undermines the resolution of the ST, because of the precedent it creates. The next writer can just create another Sith Lord from whole cloth, create the Second Order from the ashes of its predecessors, and have Rey moping on another island, such that the next false prophet can repeat the cycle, no explanation required. The Star Wars saga has thus become the movie equivalent of the boy who cried wolf.

I was pointing out that in the pre-PT world we had virtually nothing on Palpatine. The two characters are not very similar other than a lack of background the first time they are seen. And a lot of the ST is based on what they did in the old EU/Legends. Building a new Republic was not easy and they had to content with remnants of the Empire, like Thrawn. The Disney era Star Wars movies have been getting a lot of inspiration from the Legends books, though they are not really repeating anything. Knowing what happened in Legends, though I didn’t read most of them, really puts the sequels in perspective. Where you are seeing as parallels to the original, I see more parallels to Legends. Snoke has more in common with Trawn in many respects. And Snoke and his New Order have advanced things and created new technology where Trawn was fighting with left overs. But then that is a difference between 10 and 30 years after ROTJ. But the ST was always going to be about the next generation of the Skywalker family and I suspect that Ben/Kylo is going to end up with a very unique journey. If JJ and Rian have both been working off the same arc for the characters, which seems likely, then the third act is going to make this a very different trilogy from the last two. The OT was about taking down the bad guys, the PT was about the rise of the bad guys. The ST seems to be about finding the balance again. And that feels like a GL plot line. His prophesy of the chosen one bringing balance to the force seems like the core idea of what we are aiming for now. GL always denied that the force should be like ying/yang, but what Rian did in TLJ was very much ying/yang in nature, down to the image on the floor of the cave. It seems to be the answer to Luke’s unanswered quest of how to keep students from falling to the dark side.

And as for parallels, the PT very much paralleled the OT so I don’t see the ST following suit as much of an issue.

How does Snoke have more in common with Thrawn? The only commonality is, that Snoke took control of Imperial remnants. Other than that Snoke is a dark side user like Palpatine, with a former Jedi apprentice, that he seduced to the darkside, like Palpatine. He physically resembles Palpatine with a deformed body, and even gets to repeat many of Palpatine’s lines from ROTJ, after which he gets killed by his apprentice like Palpatine, because of his arrogance, and his belief that he cannot be betrayed like Palpatine.

The PT had a number of parallels with the OT, but that’s nothing compared to the ST. The PT was aesthetically and narratively totally different from the OT. The ST tells the same basic story as the OT with the same aesthetics (albeit a bit modernized), where a small band of rebels have to defeat an overwhelming Force oppressing the galaxy, and a Jedi prodigy has to seek out the help of a Jedi master to defeat a former Jedi student, who has fallen to the dark side, and is now under the influence of a dark lord.

Palpatine seized power through cunning. Snoke and Thrawn through luck and being in the right place at the right time. Palpatine took over the core of the Republic and turned it into an empire. Snoke and Trawn take over a tiny slice and build it into something to threaten the New Republic with. I see none of Palpatine’s cunning in Snoke and all of Trawn’s arrogance. If you want to focus on the force side, Snoke can’t even properly turn Ben to the dark side. He’s not even evil enough to kill his mother. Kylo Ren is not Darth Vader. And Snoke isn’t thrown into a chasm, he is cut in half by a light saber. And Kylo isn’t trying to save Rey from Snoke, Snoke thinks he knows Kylo and fails to read his deception where there was no attempt at deception from Vader. Only in the very broadest of strokes does the PT resemble the OT, but when you get down to the details it is a very different story with very different motives and agendas. In ROTJ, Vader killing Palpatine was the end of the story. Kylo killing Snoke is only the middle of the story. The similarities of TLJ to both TESB and ROTJ were not lost on me, but I found the blending to be intriguing because it leaves me wondering where they are going to go next. In the OT at this point Vader was dead and the Empire destroyed. We are at a very different place. Snoke is dead and Kylo Ren is very much alive. But which side is he on? How will his story play out now? We are way beyond any parallel with the OT at this point. The parallels have been minor at best. More structural than story. What confrontation will Rey and Kylo have in the next film? It is uncharted ground and that is what makes the ST different and unique.

DrDre said:

yotsuya said:

DrDre said:

yotsuya said:

Collipso said:

i’m only one minute in and he’s already bashing everyone that doesn’t like the movie and saying that we don’t like it simply because our theories were wrong. that’s simply not true, i liked rey being a nobody, but i wish we had more information on Snoke to help bridge the 30 year gap and how we went from ‘RIP the empire’ to ‘RIP the rebels’ with a new extremely powerful emperor. we’re two movies in already and we have no idea why the galaxy is in the state it’s in, and Snoke’s “backstory” could help with that.

What what exactly was Palpatine’s backstory before the prequels? What exactly is his backstory in the prequels? That we don’t get information on Snoke is not exactly something new.

Palpatine wasn’t someone of influence until the prequels, and we got to witness him dismantle the Republic throughout the PT in great detail. With Snoke it’s sort of an afterthought. The guy undid everything our heroes fought for somehow, but that’s not considered to be of importance, apparently. It appears to me, that what mattered most is giving us a redux of the OT conflict, and the OT aesthetic with different characters.

That isn’t an accurate assessment of the galactic situation. It is clear from the setup in TFA that the Republic is not very strong and that the great Republic of old has not been recreated. So what our heroes were fighting for in the OT has never been finished. If you look at history this is what often happens. The first government formed after a revolution doesn’t last. Usually it falls and is replaced with something else until that falls and something stronger rises in its place. All we have on the First Order is they rose from the ashes of the Empire. Clearly the production is an indication that Snoke ended up in control of an old Imperial shipyard. Who Snoke is makes little difference to the overall story. That he was there at the right time and place to create the First Order is all that matters. The rest is just filler.

That he was there “at the right time” is contrived, and diminishes the entire story arc of the OT imo. The writers just pushed the reset button and pulled another “Sith Lord” out of thin air to get us right back at the start of ANH. The New Republic is a token effort, just like stating that Kylo Ren and Snoke are not Sith Lords. The New Republic is just there to be blown away, and never seen again, such that the Resistance can become the rebels, and the FO the Empire, whilst Kylo Ren and Snoke are completely indistuinguishable from their Sith counterparts. Lucas spent an entire trilogy exploring how a democracy got turned into an Empire, whilst setting up the rivalry between the Jedi and the Sith, and showing how a young Jedi turns into a Sith Lord. The ST gives us very little context, and makes very little effort to show us how and why we’re right back at square one after two trilogies of seeing an Empire rise and fall. Meanwhile Kylo Ren is just evil, because he’s a bad egg, I guess. He’s given zero motivation for turning to the dark side. Snoke had won his heart is all we get, and Luke apparently pushed him over the edge, because that’s what Jedi do, when you need another Darth Vader.

While the story works fairly well seen on its own terms, in my view it simply doesn’t flow very well from the first six films, and clearly isn’t very original, in that it recycles an awful lot from the OT both visually and narratively. The fact that so many things are left unexplained, and unexplored only reinforces this. Snoke is thus just another Emperor redux like so many other things the ST “borrowed” from the OT. This is the real issue here. By giving Snoke an original backstory, and by making him distuinguishable from the Sith Lords that proceeded him the entire events of the ST are elevated, because it adds history and context, thus allowing the Star Wars universe and mythology to grow beyond simply rehashing what Lucas and his contemporaries did better some four decades earlier.

After six films of stories and events just plunging us into another OT inspired conflict with little context to connect the dots is not going to work for many people, because they are already too invested in the universe, and the characters. Saying Snoke is used not very differently from the Emperor in the OT, is not a defense, but an admission of guilt, because it ignores the fact, that we have had fourty years of story developments, and world building since that time. If the OT’s resolution is important, then how that happy ending got unraveled is as well. To say, that it doesn’t really matter how Snoke and the FO got to undermine the New Republic, and why the New Republic allowed itself to be overrun, is to say that the OT’s resolutions aren’t very important, because another Sith Lord can be pulled from behind the curtain to undo it anyway to extend the conflict ad nauseam. By extension this also undermines the resolution of the ST, because of the precedent it creates. The next writer can just create another Sith Lord from whole cloth, create the Second Order from the ashes of its predecessors, and have Rey moping on another island, such that the next false prophet can repeat the cycle, no explanation required. The Star Wars saga has thus become the movie equivalent of the boy who cried wolf.

I was pointing out that in the pre-PT world we had virtually nothing on Palpatine. The two characters are not very similar other than a lack of background the first time they are seen. And a lot of the ST is based on what they did in the old EU/Legends. Building a new Republic was not easy and they had to content with remnants of the Empire, like Thrawn. The Disney era Star Wars movies have been getting a lot of inspiration from the Legends books, though they are not really repeating anything. Knowing what happened in Legends, though I didn’t read most of them, really puts the sequels in perspective. Where you are seeing as parallels to the original, I see more parallels to Legends. Snoke has more in common with Trawn in many respects. And Snoke and his New Order have advanced things and created new technology where Trawn was fighting with left overs. But then that is a difference between 10 and 30 years after ROTJ. But the ST was always going to be about the next generation of the Skywalker family and I suspect that Ben/Kylo is going to end up with a very unique journey. If JJ and Rian have both been working off the same arc for the characters, which seems likely, then the third act is going to make this a very different trilogy from the last two. The OT was about taking down the bad guys, the PT was about the rise of the bad guys. The ST seems to be about finding the balance again. And that feels like a GL plot line. His prophesy of the chosen one bringing balance to the force seems like the core idea of what we are aiming for now. GL always denied that the force should be like ying/yang, but what Rian did in TLJ was very much ying/yang in nature, down to the image on the floor of the cave. It seems to be the answer to Luke’s unanswered quest of how to keep students from falling to the dark side.

And as for parallels, the PT very much paralleled the OT so I don’t see the ST following suit as much of an issue.

DrDre said:

yotsuya said:

Collipso said:

i’m only one minute in and he’s already bashing everyone that doesn’t like the movie and saying that we don’t like it simply because our theories were wrong. that’s simply not true, i liked rey being a nobody, but i wish we had more information on Snoke to help bridge the 30 year gap and how we went from ‘RIP the empire’ to ‘RIP the rebels’ with a new extremely powerful emperor. we’re two movies in already and we have no idea why the galaxy is in the state it’s in, and Snoke’s “backstory” could help with that.

What what exactly was Palpatine’s backstory before the prequels? What exactly is his backstory in the prequels? That we don’t get information on Snoke is not exactly something new.

Palpatine wasn’t someone of influence until the prequels, and we got to witness him dismantle the Republic throughout the PT in great detail. With Snoke it’s sort of an afterthought. The guy undid everything our heroes fought for somehow, but that’s not considered to be of importance, apparently. It appears to me, that what mattered most is giving us a redux of the OT conflict, and the OT aesthetic with different characters.

That isn’t an accurate assessment of the galactic situation. It is clear from the setup in TFA that the Republic is not very strong and that the great Republic of old has not been recreated. So what our heroes were fighting for in the OT has never been finished. If you look at history this is what often happens. The first government formed after a revolution doesn’t last. Usually it falls and is replaced with something else until that falls and something stronger rises in its place. All we have on the First Order is they rose from the ashes of the Empire. Clearly the production is an indication that Snoke ended up in control of an old Imperial shipyard. Who Snoke is makes little difference to the overall story. That he was there at the right time and place to create the First Order is all that matters. The rest is just filler.

And Palpatine was someone of influence. He dissolved the Senate in ANH. Just because the novelization of ANH had the picture of a weak emperor does not mean that is what the movies portray. Though when you really analize it with the Prequels, you get a dual personality Emperor. Publically he is Palpatine, a pushover. In the shadows he is Dark Sidious and is the one pulling all the strings. So that public pushover you find in the ANH novelization turns out to be as correct as the powerful sith lord we see in the movies.

DrDre said:

yotsuya said:

DrDre said:

yotsuya said:

Well, I disagree entirely. First off, it is obvious we are supposed to side with Poe. Holdo is expecting Poe to follow orders. That he doesn’t is not surprising because she doesn’t share what she is doing. And ultimately it is Poe who turns Holdo’s cunning plan into a disaster. Poe sends Finn and Rose off to solve the problem his way. A daring venture full of risks with a possible payoff. But because they do not find the hacker that Maz recommends (probably because he can be trusted) and they end up with DJ and DJ learns of Holdo’s plan, when the mission goes sour he uses that to get himself out of trouble. As a result most of the resistance is destroyed, rather than losing the one ship and hiding out on Crait until someone came to get them. Poe is a hotshot pilot but that is not what makes a leader. Knowing when to not be the hotshot and play it safe is the lesson he needed and he got it the hard way. However the movie makes it very clear that if he hadn’t gone ahead and destroyed the dreadnaught at the beginning, it would have wiped them out later. So his first reckless act that he got demoted for turned out to be the right thing to do at the time, but after the fallout, Poe is making wiser decisions. Not bad for a character Abrams almost killed off.

That story line is full of old war movie tropes. How Holdo treats Poe, how Poe reacts, and how he learns. That may not be your real world experience, but it is many people’s. And Holdo doesn’t seem like she is much of a people person. One of those who rose to command through brilliant tactics. She obviously is a friend of Leia’s. So her tough treatment of Poe makes a lot of sense. Military methods of leadership are not the same as private sector methods. The military needs people who will follow orders without question plus brilliant strategists. So using civilian leadership techniques to critique a military interaction doesn’t work well. The same rules don’t apply. There is a reason why the traditional drill sergeant is tough and gruff. Dressing down a subordinate in a military setting isn’t about their well being, it is about their discipline and willingness to follow orders. In a military setting you need someone who will not panic and will act on their training no matter the price. In a civilian setting an employee’s life is rarely on the line and you rarely need blind obedience. So it is comparing apples to oranges.

So both on the writing side and on the realism side, this part of the story reflects some brilliant writing. I find the entire movie to be brilliant. I love it more the more I watch it. And it is definitely very Star Wars. War movies and samurai movies were very much a part of the original trilogy and Rian Johnson captured that part far better than Abrams did in TFA. I watched Twelve O’Clock High and Three Outlaw Samurai after I heard they, plus To Catch A Thief, were classics Rian Johnson was watching to prepare for this movie. Three brilliant films that definitely had an influence.

Maybe you should read the link I posted from someone with actual military experience, who makes it very clear, that in his military experience Holdo is not a good leader, both from the perspective of how she deals with Poe, and from the perspective of her strategy with regards to the FO. Being in the military is about more than following orders, and being a military leader is about more than forcing your will onto someone, or expecting people to blindly follow orders. The fact is that her leadership resulted in a mutiny, because she didn’t communicate her strategy in a highly tense, and life threatening situation. She has final responsibility, and she failed to communicate her plans even when Poe relieved her of her command at gun point.

Have you seen Twelve O’Clock High? If not then we are coming from different places. I have no personal military experience, only historical research related to WWII, the Indian Wars and the Civil War. Plus a crapload of war and military movies. First off, a superior officer does not have to tell those under them the plans or the reasons for the plans. That isn’t how chain of command works. I did briefly work under a police chief who was a stickler for chain of command and while the police and military do things somewhat differently, certain concepts are identical. One is the chain of command. Twelve O’clock High is directly about a superior officer who must earn the trust of the men under him when he assumes command after a beloved but inept commander has been removed. It has a lot of other things in it. Plus many of the other things are echoes in Three Outlaw Samurai and many other WWII and Saumurai movies. Twelve O’Clock High in particular was made with the full cooperation of the US Military.

And while I know that not everyone still abide by the old strict chain of command structure, that is one thing that drives Twelve O’Clock High. The removed commander doesn’t follow the book and has a horrible unit while the replacement is by the book, makes some enemies, and turns the unit into one of the best - increasing efficiency and reducing casualties. So I think that movie in itself and the wisdom of our military training programs it represents, whether they are currently adhered to or not, is more relevant than what a single person who has served in the modern military has to say. There is a reason why drill sergeant are so hard on people and there is a reason why they are so effective. And there is a reason why movies portray people like that the way they do. So Holdo isn’t doing anything out of typical military practice by not telling Poe what the plan is. Commanders don’t generally do that without good reason. And Poe, because he related that plan to Finn and Rose, is directly responsible for all the ships that are destroyed. So she had good reason not to tell him that is born out by the events in the film. Poe didn’t need to know and had no business telling Finn and Rose. He was acting on his own initiative outside the chain of command. He didn’t trust Holdo. That concept comes directly from Twelve O’Clock High.

And from everything I’ve heard, read, studied, researched about our military training, the reason for the harsh training is to instill in soldiers that they follow orders without question. When their commander says charge, they charge. If a commander can’t trust that those under him follow his orders, then he can’t reasonably hope for any plan go as planned and have a chance at success. It has been the core of our military training since Valley Forge.

Here’s a relevant link:

https://warontherocks.com/2017/07/when-can-a-soldier-disobey-an-order/

I disagree with your assertion, that our military are trained to blindly follow orders, in fact they are specifically instructed to also think for themselves to determine for example, if an order is lawfull. Poe is not only there to follow orders, he’s also responsible for the men and women who serve under him. If he believes his commander has lost her mind, is in some way incapacitated, or is unfit for command as set out in regulations (in this case to the point, that he believes, she’s about to get everyone killed), it’s his duty to intervene. A chain of command is maintained through communication, if a person at the top or any other level does not communicate, that chain is broken.

Then there’s also the fact, that she still refuses to communicate, when a mutiny breaks out. At that point it is clearly in her and the Resistance’s best interest, that she diffuses the situation as quickly as possible, before things spiral even further out of control. Informing Poe of her plan may achieve this. She cannot pass all the blame to Poe for the fallout, if she doesn’t do this, because as the person in charge she is ultimately responsible for the safety of her crew. If there’s an option, that results in the least casualties, she should take it, and deal with Poe appropriately at a more convenient time in a court martial, where his and her actions can be examined.

The movie Crimson Tide comes to mind, where the nuclear submarine’s second in command refuses to follow the captain’s orders, because he feels the captain is not following proper procedure, and is thus endangering the crew, and the United States. He subsequently starts a mutiny. At the end of the movie both the captain and his subordinate are held responsible in a tribunal for the sequence of events, because they failed to communicate, and to resolve their issues, which resulted in an extremely dangerous life threatening situation.

You are ignoring the necessity of keeping some plans secret. Holdo doesn’t know all these people very well but what she does know is that Poe was just demoted by Leia. He is a fighter pilot and squad commander, not a capital ship command crew. She really has no reason to tell him her plans. There is no credible story reason for General Holdo to tell Poe the plan. He is not needed to execute it and would just be loaded on the shuttles with the rest of the crew when the time came. You are giving him a far more important role in the resistance than he actually has. And by that time he is a fighter pilot with no command and no ship. Why in the world would she tell him anything? She acts like a general should, leading and expecting those under her to follow. Those who needed to know the plan knew it (the navigator plotting the course, the crew supervising the fuel transfer, etc). Poe has no patience and thinks he knows what is best and he doesn’t. That is his character development in this film. He goes from a brash, hotshot pilot, to a real leader who now realizes that just because he isn’t in on the plan does not mean it is not a good plan. Good grief. If ever person of his rank in the US Army in WWII had acted that way, we would have lost the war. Do you know how many times they had to operate under sealed orders? How many times they didn’t know until the last minutes what their mission was? Missions were kept top secret for a reason. Poe seems blissfully unaware of that fact of military planning. And in this film HE is the leak that sinks the ship. Because of him the First Order finds out about Holdo’s plan and most of the ships are destroyed. It was an expensive lesson for Poe. But Poe blabs what is going on over the comm and DJ uses what he heard to buy his freedom when they are caught. Secrecy in combat situations is not unusual and is necessary. So this entire argument that Holdo should have told Poe is nonsense. It shows a complete lack of understanding of basic information security during a war.

Collipso said:

i’m only one minute in and he’s already bashing everyone that doesn’t like the movie and saying that we don’t like it simply because our theories were wrong. that’s simply not true, i liked rey being a nobody, but i wish we had more information on Snoke to help bridge the 30 year gap and how we went from ‘RIP the empire’ to ‘RIP the rebels’ with a new extremely powerful emperor. we’re two movies in already and we have no idea why the galaxy is in the state it’s in, and Snoke’s “backstory” could help with that.

What what exactly was Palpatine’s backstory before the prequels? What exactly is his backstory in the prequels? That we don’t get information on Snoke is not exactly something new.