The Last Jedi: Official Review and Opinions Thread ** SPOILERS ** — Page 96

TV’s Frink said:

I never knew so many people thought Luke was perfect by the final scene of ROTJ and he’d be the exact same person 30-some years later.

Obviously when you decide not to turn to the dark side, that makes you a perfect person. And once you’re a perfect person, you’re pretty much set there for life.

Seriously though, people are expecting things from Luke based on who he was in ROTJ that shouldn’t necessarily hold true for the character some 30 years later. And honestly, I have a lot of problems with how Luke is portrayed in ROTJ anyway.

DrDre said:

yotsuya said:

DrDre said:

yotsuya said:

DrDre said:

Warbler said:

Possessed said:

You do make a good point.

I disagree.

What happened to Obi-Wan and Yoda:

• Jedi purge aided by Obi-Wan’s former apprentice now Darth Vader
• Galactic Empire takes over the galaxy
• Yoda and Obi-Wan face off against Sidious and Vader despite terrible odds
• Yoda fights Sidious to a stalemate and is forced to flee, as troops arrive
• Obi-Wan defeats Vader, leaving him for dead
• Obi-Wan and Yoda are now hunted by the Empire, branded traitors with the approval of the Senate, and are forced into hiding
• Obi-Wan and Yoda hide Luke and Leia
• It takes twenty years for the Rebel Alliance to become a significant threat to the Empire’s powerbase
• Leia asks Obi-Wan for help in their most desparate hour, Obi-Wan answers their call

What happened to Luke:

• Luke’s Jedi Academy is destroyed by his former apprentice partly caused by Luke’s unfortunate mistake
• New Republic controls most of the galaxy
• FO is growing in power, but at this point still a fringe government
• Despite the fact that there’s still plenty of opportunity to stop the FO with the help of the Resistance and the Republic fleet, Luke doesn’t even try, and goes into exile, leaving everything behind
• In Luke’s absence the FO grows in power to the point, that it is able to destroy the Republic capital and take over the galaxy
• Luke refuses to help even after his sister Leia through Rey informs him of their situation, and his best friend has been murdered

Except let’s look at what is going on in each instance. In the PT (or even the OT backstory prior to the PT), the Empire has taken over, the Jedi have been hunted down. Ben and Yoda are in hiding. Waiting for something. They have hope that something will change.

Luke has just had his entire new order of Jedi wiped out (either killed or turned to the dark side). We don’t really know how many, but it wasn’t a lot. The facility is wiped out and the leader is none other than his own nephew. He fears that if he trains anyone else, the same thing will happen again. And Snoke and the Knights of Ren make a force that he does not have the power to combat. He would not kill his father in ROTJ so I’m sure he would not kill his nephew.

So the situations are vastly different in terms of what is at stake personally. Also remember, that Ben and Yoda were fully trained Jedi masters. They had learned to put their emotions behind them. When did Luke learn that lesson. We see in ROTJ that he is still prone to letting his emotions take control. He uses that to defeat Vader. As Johnson writes the lines for Luke to speak, he is also addressing fans who have idolized Luke and made him into something that the movies don’t show. The movies never show him attaining true Jedi mastery of his emotions and feelings. And the events that led to his self imposed exile in the ST are ones that, given the character traits shown and mentioned in the OT, would lead him to do exactly what he did. Luke was never perfect, only very determined. He used the Jedi training he had been taught and it failed his padawans. The same way it failed Kenobi in training Anakin. Luke sees that failing but does not know how to correct it. I saw it quite clearly in the PT that Lucas was showing that it wasn’t Kenobi or Yoda who failed, but the Jedi teachings. We are back to that. The Old Republic Jedi order had a major flaw - they didn’t teach their padawan how to avoid the temptation of the dark side. They just said don’t start down that path. They had gotten to a point where they denied attachments because it might lead that way instead of teaching how to avoid and resist the temptation. It is like teaching abstinence instead contraception to avoid teen pregnancies. It doesn’t work. Both Ben Solo and Anakin needed teachings that the Jedi didn’t have and that Luke doesn’t have.

Luke had three choices after Kylo turned. He could go after Kylo Ren and defeat him and the other dark ones. He could build a new order of Jedi to combat them - but the conflict would come eventually and there was no certainty that the new students wouldn’t be cut down or turned like the previous batch. Or he could decide not to kill and go into hiding. Staying and helping Leia really wasn’t an option because Snoke was already there and he would be expected to train new Jedi. And that is what he now fears. Luke rightly sees the Jedi order as flawed. He has given up instead of finding a way to fix it. And if you go back and watch the original, what he did is exactly in keeping with his character traits as established in the OT.

Sorry this really makes no sense to me. Luke refuses to train more Jedi, because he might fail. In stead he allows Snoke to take Ben Solo and to create any number of dark Force users. So, rather than take a risk, which may lead to a victory for the good guys, he opts for certain doom by doing nothing.

If Luke does nothing, the galaxy will be plunged into a second darkness, as there’s nobody to stand in Snoke’s way. If Luke tries to stop Snoke and Kylo, he might prevail, and then retire the Jedi Order, or he might be killed resulting in the end of the Jedi. Doing nothing obvioysly is the worst choice. Luke would be stupid for not being able to deduce this.

This is absolutely not in keeping with Luke’s character, who went on a suicide mission to destroy the Death Star even without significant knowledge of the Force.

Really? Remember in TESB, “I can’t, its too big” of trying to lift his X-wing out of the swamp? And Luke didn’t lead a suicide mission on the death Star. He was one of 30 pilots. And Luke’s failure was huge. He failed Han and Leia, not just Ben and the other students. And with retreat after failure already in him, such a huge setback could easily bring that out again. It is very in keeping with is personality as the OT presented it, though not as the Expended Universe built him up or as many fans have come to see him. This movie really restored humanity to Luke.

Only if you deny Luke’s character development from the moment he failed to lift the X-wing. Discovering Darth Vader is his father, shattered everything Luke believed in. Yet, he overcame it, and ultimately became a Jedi, and redeemed his father.

Additionally the fact that he even for a moment thought about killing his nephew to the point that he activated his lightsaber, when his nephew had done nothing, but be tempted by the dark side, is just not credible. Luke refused to even fight is father, a man who was everything Luke feared his nephew might become and worse. The Luke of ROTJ would have attempted to redeem his nephew, not murder him in his sleep.

Except that even though Luke refused to fight his father, he still did, and almost killed him. And that Luke immediately regretted igniting his lightsaber, and would have likely tried to save Ben instead had he had the chance.

DrDre said:

yotsuya said:

DrDre said:

yotsuya said:

DrDre said:

Warbler said:

Possessed said:

You do make a good point.

I disagree.

What happened to Obi-Wan and Yoda:

• Jedi purge aided by Obi-Wan’s former apprentice now Darth Vader
• Galactic Empire takes over the galaxy
• Yoda and Obi-Wan face off against Sidious and Vader despite terrible odds
• Yoda fights Sidious to a stalemate and is forced to flee, as troops arrive
• Obi-Wan defeats Vader, leaving him for dead
• Obi-Wan and Yoda are now hunted by the Empire, branded traitors with the approval of the Senate, and are forced into hiding
• Obi-Wan and Yoda hide Luke and Leia
• It takes twenty years for the Rebel Alliance to become a significant threat to the Empire’s powerbase
• Leia asks Obi-Wan for help in their most desparate hour, Obi-Wan answers their call

What happened to Luke:

• Luke’s Jedi Academy is destroyed by his former apprentice partly caused by Luke’s unfortunate mistake
• New Republic controls most of the galaxy
• FO is growing in power, but at this point still a fringe government
• Despite the fact that there’s still plenty of opportunity to stop the FO with the help of the Resistance and the Republic fleet, Luke doesn’t even try, and goes into exile, leaving everything behind
• In Luke’s absence the FO grows in power to the point, that it is able to destroy the Republic capital and take over the galaxy
• Luke refuses to help even after his sister Leia through Rey informs him of their situation, and his best friend has been murdered

Except let’s look at what is going on in each instance. In the PT (or even the OT backstory prior to the PT), the Empire has taken over, the Jedi have been hunted down. Ben and Yoda are in hiding. Waiting for something. They have hope that something will change.

Luke has just had his entire new order of Jedi wiped out (either killed or turned to the dark side). We don’t really know how many, but it wasn’t a lot. The facility is wiped out and the leader is none other than his own nephew. He fears that if he trains anyone else, the same thing will happen again. And Snoke and the Knights of Ren make a force that he does not have the power to combat. He would not kill his father in ROTJ so I’m sure he would not kill his nephew.

So the situations are vastly different in terms of what is at stake personally. Also remember, that Ben and Yoda were fully trained Jedi masters. They had learned to put their emotions behind them. When did Luke learn that lesson. We see in ROTJ that he is still prone to letting his emotions take control. He uses that to defeat Vader. As Johnson writes the lines for Luke to speak, he is also addressing fans who have idolized Luke and made him into something that the movies don’t show. The movies never show him attaining true Jedi mastery of his emotions and feelings. And the events that led to his self imposed exile in the ST are ones that, given the character traits shown and mentioned in the OT, would lead him to do exactly what he did. Luke was never perfect, only very determined. He used the Jedi training he had been taught and it failed his padawans. The same way it failed Kenobi in training Anakin. Luke sees that failing but does not know how to correct it. I saw it quite clearly in the PT that Lucas was showing that it wasn’t Kenobi or Yoda who failed, but the Jedi teachings. We are back to that. The Old Republic Jedi order had a major flaw - they didn’t teach their padawan how to avoid the temptation of the dark side. They just said don’t start down that path. They had gotten to a point where they denied attachments because it might lead that way instead of teaching how to avoid and resist the temptation. It is like teaching abstinence instead contraception to avoid teen pregnancies. It doesn’t work. Both Ben Solo and Anakin needed teachings that the Jedi didn’t have and that Luke doesn’t have.

Luke had three choices after Kylo turned. He could go after Kylo Ren and defeat him and the other dark ones. He could build a new order of Jedi to combat them - but the conflict would come eventually and there was no certainty that the new students wouldn’t be cut down or turned like the previous batch. Or he could decide not to kill and go into hiding. Staying and helping Leia really wasn’t an option because Snoke was already there and he would be expected to train new Jedi. And that is what he now fears. Luke rightly sees the Jedi order as flawed. He has given up instead of finding a way to fix it. And if you go back and watch the original, what he did is exactly in keeping with his character traits as established in the OT.

Sorry this really makes no sense to me. Luke refuses to train more Jedi, because he might fail. In stead he allows Snoke to take Ben Solo and to create any number of dark Force users. So, rather than take a risk, which may lead to a victory for the good guys, he opts for certain doom by doing nothing.

If Luke does nothing, the galaxy will be plunged into a second darkness, as there’s nobody to stand in Snoke’s way. If Luke tries to stop Snoke and Kylo, he might prevail, and then retire the Jedi Order, or he might be killed resulting in the end of the Jedi. Doing nothing obvioysly is the worst choice. Luke would be stupid for not being able to deduce this.

This is absolutely not in keeping with Luke’s character, who went on a suicide mission to destroy the Death Star even without significant knowledge of the Force.

Really? Remember in TESB, “I can’t, its too big” of trying to lift his X-wing out of the swamp? And Luke didn’t lead a suicide mission on the death Star. He was one of 30 pilots. And Luke’s failure was huge. He failed Han and Leia, not just Ben and the other students. And with retreat after failure already in him, such a huge setback could easily bring that out again. It is very in keeping with is personality as the OT presented it, though not as the Expended Universe built him up or as many fans have come to see him. This movie really restored humanity to Luke.

Only if you deny Luke’s character development from the moment he failed to lift the X-wing. Discovering Darth Vader is his father, shattered everything Luke believed in. Yet, he overcame it, and ultimately became a Jedi, and redeemed his father.

Additionally the fact that he even for a moment thought about killing his nephew to the point that he activated his lightsaber, when his nephew had done nothing, but be tempted by the dark side, is just not credible. Luke refused to even fight is father, a man who was everything Luke feared his nephew might become and worse. The Luke of ROTJ would have attempted to redeem his nephew, not murder him in his sleep.

Who ignited and swung their saber first? Luke.

DominicCobb said:

Disney Ruined Star Wars said:

DominicCobb said:

Disney Ruined Star Wars said:

Another criticism is the tonal problems. The prequels had the same problems with tone. Really not even considering the gravity of certain moments and jumping straight to buffoonery or bathroom jokes. There is a lot of that in TLJ and also talk about how bad the Jedi are.

Honestly this movie felt like an homage to the prequels and was even worse than them. TFA was at least much better.

The only reason jokes were a tonal problem in the PT was because they were aimed squarely at children, although they were not necessarily things children actually found funny. TLJ just makes normal jokes, and they’re funny jokes. PT jokes aren’t jokes, they’re Lucas’s approximation of jokes. So they’re not funny and don’t fit in at all.

I disagree with this. Comedy and tone are different. Maybe they are sometimes related I guess. But comedy is more subjective. If you think something is funny who can argue you with you? For me, I didn’t find almost anything in this movie funny and it didn’t feel like Star Wars humor either. I’ve seen a lot of people agree.

But tone is more objective. It’s not really about whether something is aimed at children. RLM had some great examples in their prequel criticism videos. I wonder if they will do the same on this movie. It really did feel like watching Attack of the Clones to me.

You misunderstand me a bit.

I think it is possible to achieve a proper tonal balance between drama and comedy. I believe TLJ achieves that balance (not just because the simple fact that the jokes are funny, but because they are well integrated and feel true to the characters and situations, which makes them funny). I do not think the PT does, because I believe the humor is forced in, almost an afterthought, designed to get kids to laugh. That is why the tonal mishaps take place.

Humor is extremely subjective I think. More so than most things. I watched it December 14th first showing, and most people left talking about how most of the jokes were awful. The only ones I thought were funny were Luke tickling Rey and Luke saying she’s from nowhere. The rest was pretty bad.

ps: I thought the humor in Rogue One worked 1,000,000 times better. I didn’t like the humor in TFA. Nor in the prequels.

The theater I was in laughed at 90% of the jokes both screenings. So yeah, definitely subjective.

Mrebo said:

TV’s Frink said:

I never knew so many people thought Luke was perfect by the final scene of ROTJ and he’d be the exact same person 30-some years later.

Maybe I missed something in a post, but who thought Luke was perfect by the final scene of ROTJ? Who thought he should be exactly the same?

Obviously a slight exaggeration but how some of you are talking like.

My theater laughed at 100% of the jokes opening night (even when I didn’t).

Obviously humor is subjective. I thought TLJ and TFA were easily the funniest SW films there’ve been. I liked some of the jokes in Rogue One too. Even the prequels have some good jokes. I’m mainly talking about joke integration. Most of the jokes in the PT are completely random, such as Jar Jar smelling a bad fart before the pod race. Just total distractions. That’s where the problem lies.

DominicCobb said:

DrDre said:

yotsuya said:

DrDre said:

yotsuya said:

DrDre said:

Warbler said:

Possessed said:

You do make a good point.

I disagree.

What happened to Obi-Wan and Yoda:

• Jedi purge aided by Obi-Wan’s former apprentice now Darth Vader
• Galactic Empire takes over the galaxy
• Yoda and Obi-Wan face off against Sidious and Vader despite terrible odds
• Yoda fights Sidious to a stalemate and is forced to flee, as troops arrive
• Obi-Wan defeats Vader, leaving him for dead
• Obi-Wan and Yoda are now hunted by the Empire, branded traitors with the approval of the Senate, and are forced into hiding
• Obi-Wan and Yoda hide Luke and Leia
• It takes twenty years for the Rebel Alliance to become a significant threat to the Empire’s powerbase
• Leia asks Obi-Wan for help in their most desparate hour, Obi-Wan answers their call

What happened to Luke:

• Luke’s Jedi Academy is destroyed by his former apprentice partly caused by Luke’s unfortunate mistake
• New Republic controls most of the galaxy
• FO is growing in power, but at this point still a fringe government
• Despite the fact that there’s still plenty of opportunity to stop the FO with the help of the Resistance and the Republic fleet, Luke doesn’t even try, and goes into exile, leaving everything behind
• In Luke’s absence the FO grows in power to the point, that it is able to destroy the Republic capital and take over the galaxy
• Luke refuses to help even after his sister Leia through Rey informs him of their situation, and his best friend has been murdered

Except let’s look at what is going on in each instance. In the PT (or even the OT backstory prior to the PT), the Empire has taken over, the Jedi have been hunted down. Ben and Yoda are in hiding. Waiting for something. They have hope that something will change.

Luke has just had his entire new order of Jedi wiped out (either killed or turned to the dark side). We don’t really know how many, but it wasn’t a lot. The facility is wiped out and the leader is none other than his own nephew. He fears that if he trains anyone else, the same thing will happen again. And Snoke and the Knights of Ren make a force that he does not have the power to combat. He would not kill his father in ROTJ so I’m sure he would not kill his nephew.

So the situations are vastly different in terms of what is at stake personally. Also remember, that Ben and Yoda were fully trained Jedi masters. They had learned to put their emotions behind them. When did Luke learn that lesson. We see in ROTJ that he is still prone to letting his emotions take control. He uses that to defeat Vader. As Johnson writes the lines for Luke to speak, he is also addressing fans who have idolized Luke and made him into something that the movies don’t show. The movies never show him attaining true Jedi mastery of his emotions and feelings. And the events that led to his self imposed exile in the ST are ones that, given the character traits shown and mentioned in the OT, would lead him to do exactly what he did. Luke was never perfect, only very determined. He used the Jedi training he had been taught and it failed his padawans. The same way it failed Kenobi in training Anakin. Luke sees that failing but does not know how to correct it. I saw it quite clearly in the PT that Lucas was showing that it wasn’t Kenobi or Yoda who failed, but the Jedi teachings. We are back to that. The Old Republic Jedi order had a major flaw - they didn’t teach their padawan how to avoid the temptation of the dark side. They just said don’t start down that path. They had gotten to a point where they denied attachments because it might lead that way instead of teaching how to avoid and resist the temptation. It is like teaching abstinence instead contraception to avoid teen pregnancies. It doesn’t work. Both Ben Solo and Anakin needed teachings that the Jedi didn’t have and that Luke doesn’t have.

Luke had three choices after Kylo turned. He could go after Kylo Ren and defeat him and the other dark ones. He could build a new order of Jedi to combat them - but the conflict would come eventually and there was no certainty that the new students wouldn’t be cut down or turned like the previous batch. Or he could decide not to kill and go into hiding. Staying and helping Leia really wasn’t an option because Snoke was already there and he would be expected to train new Jedi. And that is what he now fears. Luke rightly sees the Jedi order as flawed. He has given up instead of finding a way to fix it. And if you go back and watch the original, what he did is exactly in keeping with his character traits as established in the OT.

Sorry this really makes no sense to me. Luke refuses to train more Jedi, because he might fail. In stead he allows Snoke to take Ben Solo and to create any number of dark Force users. So, rather than take a risk, which may lead to a victory for the good guys, he opts for certain doom by doing nothing.

If Luke does nothing, the galaxy will be plunged into a second darkness, as there’s nobody to stand in Snoke’s way. If Luke tries to stop Snoke and Kylo, he might prevail, and then retire the Jedi Order, or he might be killed resulting in the end of the Jedi. Doing nothing obvioysly is the worst choice. Luke would be stupid for not being able to deduce this.

This is absolutely not in keeping with Luke’s character, who went on a suicide mission to destroy the Death Star even without significant knowledge of the Force.

Really? Remember in TESB, “I can’t, its too big” of trying to lift his X-wing out of the swamp? And Luke didn’t lead a suicide mission on the death Star. He was one of 30 pilots. And Luke’s failure was huge. He failed Han and Leia, not just Ben and the other students. And with retreat after failure already in him, such a huge setback could easily bring that out again. It is very in keeping with is personality as the OT presented it, though not as the Expended Universe built him up or as many fans have come to see him. This movie really restored humanity to Luke.

Only if you deny Luke’s character development from the moment he failed to lift the X-wing. Discovering Darth Vader is his father, shattered everything Luke believed in. Yet, he overcame it, and ultimately became a Jedi, and redeemed his father.

Additionally the fact that he even for a moment thought about killing his nephew to the point that he activated his lightsaber, when his nephew had done nothing, but be tempted by the dark side, is just not credible. Luke refused to even fight is father, a man who was everything Luke feared his nephew might become and worse. The Luke of ROTJ would have attempted to redeem his nephew, not murder him in his sleep.

Except that even though Luke refused to fight his father, he still did, and almost killed him. And that Luke immediately regretted igniting his lightsaber, and would have likely tried to save Ben instead had he had the chance.

Luke fought his father, because he was manipulated by Palpatine, after seeing his friends getting slaughtered by Imperial forces. ROTJ provided ample motivation for Luke to feel desperate. TLJ provided no such motivation. If we had seen Kylo hurt one of Luke’s students, I could have understood Luke being emotionally compromised as he entered Kylo’s bedroom. We are now supposed to believe a vision was enough to terrify Luke into raising his lightsaber, when he was able for a long time to resist Palpatine’s goading him in the face of real danger.

Visions were enough to turn Anakin to the dark side. Like father like son, I suppose.

I just don’t see it as a problem. The temptations are always there for a Jedi. That makes sense to me, and I don’t see much difference between that and what happened in the Emperor’s throne room.

yotsuya said:

DrDre said:

yotsuya said:

DrDre said:

yotsuya said:

DrDre said:

Warbler said:

Possessed said:

You do make a good point.

I disagree.

What happened to Obi-Wan and Yoda:

• Jedi purge aided by Obi-Wan’s former apprentice now Darth Vader
• Galactic Empire takes over the galaxy
• Yoda and Obi-Wan face off against Sidious and Vader despite terrible odds
• Yoda fights Sidious to a stalemate and is forced to flee, as troops arrive
• Obi-Wan defeats Vader, leaving him for dead
• Obi-Wan and Yoda are now hunted by the Empire, branded traitors with the approval of the Senate, and are forced into hiding
• Obi-Wan and Yoda hide Luke and Leia
• It takes twenty years for the Rebel Alliance to become a significant threat to the Empire’s powerbase
• Leia asks Obi-Wan for help in their most desparate hour, Obi-Wan answers their call

What happened to Luke:

• Luke’s Jedi Academy is destroyed by his former apprentice partly caused by Luke’s unfortunate mistake
• New Republic controls most of the galaxy
• FO is growing in power, but at this point still a fringe government
• Despite the fact that there’s still plenty of opportunity to stop the FO with the help of the Resistance and the Republic fleet, Luke doesn’t even try, and goes into exile, leaving everything behind
• In Luke’s absence the FO grows in power to the point, that it is able to destroy the Republic capital and take over the galaxy
• Luke refuses to help even after his sister Leia through Rey informs him of their situation, and his best friend has been murdered

Except let’s look at what is going on in each instance. In the PT (or even the OT backstory prior to the PT), the Empire has taken over, the Jedi have been hunted down. Ben and Yoda are in hiding. Waiting for something. They have hope that something will change.

Luke has just had his entire new order of Jedi wiped out (either killed or turned to the dark side). We don’t really know how many, but it wasn’t a lot. The facility is wiped out and the leader is none other than his own nephew. He fears that if he trains anyone else, the same thing will happen again. And Snoke and the Knights of Ren make a force that he does not have the power to combat. He would not kill his father in ROTJ so I’m sure he would not kill his nephew.

So the situations are vastly different in terms of what is at stake personally. Also remember, that Ben and Yoda were fully trained Jedi masters. They had learned to put their emotions behind them. When did Luke learn that lesson. We see in ROTJ that he is still prone to letting his emotions take control. He uses that to defeat Vader. As Johnson writes the lines for Luke to speak, he is also addressing fans who have idolized Luke and made him into something that the movies don’t show. The movies never show him attaining true Jedi mastery of his emotions and feelings. And the events that led to his self imposed exile in the ST are ones that, given the character traits shown and mentioned in the OT, would lead him to do exactly what he did. Luke was never perfect, only very determined. He used the Jedi training he had been taught and it failed his padawans. The same way it failed Kenobi in training Anakin. Luke sees that failing but does not know how to correct it. I saw it quite clearly in the PT that Lucas was showing that it wasn’t Kenobi or Yoda who failed, but the Jedi teachings. We are back to that. The Old Republic Jedi order had a major flaw - they didn’t teach their padawan how to avoid the temptation of the dark side. They just said don’t start down that path. They had gotten to a point where they denied attachments because it might lead that way instead of teaching how to avoid and resist the temptation. It is like teaching abstinence instead contraception to avoid teen pregnancies. It doesn’t work. Both Ben Solo and Anakin needed teachings that the Jedi didn’t have and that Luke doesn’t have.

Luke had three choices after Kylo turned. He could go after Kylo Ren and defeat him and the other dark ones. He could build a new order of Jedi to combat them - but the conflict would come eventually and there was no certainty that the new students wouldn’t be cut down or turned like the previous batch. Or he could decide not to kill and go into hiding. Staying and helping Leia really wasn’t an option because Snoke was already there and he would be expected to train new Jedi. And that is what he now fears. Luke rightly sees the Jedi order as flawed. He has given up instead of finding a way to fix it. And if you go back and watch the original, what he did is exactly in keeping with his character traits as established in the OT.

Sorry this really makes no sense to me. Luke refuses to train more Jedi, because he might fail. In stead he allows Snoke to take Ben Solo and to create any number of dark Force users. So, rather than take a risk, which may lead to a victory for the good guys, he opts for certain doom by doing nothing.

If Luke does nothing, the galaxy will be plunged into a second darkness, as there’s nobody to stand in Snoke’s way. If Luke tries to stop Snoke and Kylo, he might prevail, and then retire the Jedi Order, or he might be killed resulting in the end of the Jedi. Doing nothing obvioysly is the worst choice. Luke would be stupid for not being able to deduce this.

This is absolutely not in keeping with Luke’s character, who went on a suicide mission to destroy the Death Star even without significant knowledge of the Force.

Really? Remember in TESB, “I can’t, its too big” of trying to lift his X-wing out of the swamp? And Luke didn’t lead a suicide mission on the death Star. He was one of 30 pilots. And Luke’s failure was huge. He failed Han and Leia, not just Ben and the other students. And with retreat after failure already in him, such a huge setback could easily bring that out again. It is very in keeping with is personality as the OT presented it, though not as the Expended Universe built him up or as many fans have come to see him. This movie really restored humanity to Luke.

Only if you deny Luke’s character development from the moment he failed to lift the X-wing. Discovering Darth Vader is his father, shattered everything Luke believed in. Yet, he overcame it, and ultimately became a Jedi, and redeemed his father.

Additionally the fact that he even for a moment thought about killing his nephew to the point that he activated his lightsaber, when his nephew had done nothing, but be tempted by the dark side, is just not credible. Luke refused to even fight is father, a man who was everything Luke feared his nephew might become and worse. The Luke of ROTJ would have attempted to redeem his nephew, not murder him in his sleep.

Who ignited and swung their saber first? Luke.

After Palpatine had goaded him, and his friends and allies were in real mortal danger. As I stated before ROTJ sets up Luke losing his composure over multiple scenes. TLJ gives us only a single short scene with a Force vision of something that might happen. It’s not the same thing. If TLJ had set up Kylo as being a real danger to Luke’s students, by hurting one of them, it might have worked for me. As it is now Luke’s terrified of a dream, when he kept his cool for a long time in the face of real danger before.

Collipso said:
ps: I thought the humor in Rogue One worked 1,000,000 times better.

That Vader Scene wasn’t funny at all. Just a bad joke.

We don’t even know what he saw. It could have been so bad it was clear there was no saving Ben. Maybe it was a likely future. And he had a moment of weakness, and then he came through it. If you don’t think he can have a one second lapse in judgement, then yes, you think he should be perfect.

DrDre said:

yotsuya said:

DrDre said:

yotsuya said:

DrDre said:

yotsuya said:

DrDre said:

Warbler said:

Possessed said:

You do make a good point.

I disagree.

What happened to Obi-Wan and Yoda:

• Jedi purge aided by Obi-Wan’s former apprentice now Darth Vader
• Galactic Empire takes over the galaxy
• Yoda and Obi-Wan face off against Sidious and Vader despite terrible odds
• Yoda fights Sidious to a stalemate and is forced to flee, as troops arrive
• Obi-Wan defeats Vader, leaving him for dead
• Obi-Wan and Yoda are now hunted by the Empire, branded traitors with the approval of the Senate, and are forced into hiding
• Obi-Wan and Yoda hide Luke and Leia
• It takes twenty years for the Rebel Alliance to become a significant threat to the Empire’s powerbase
• Leia asks Obi-Wan for help in their most desparate hour, Obi-Wan answers their call

What happened to Luke:

• Luke’s Jedi Academy is destroyed by his former apprentice partly caused by Luke’s unfortunate mistake
• New Republic controls most of the galaxy
• FO is growing in power, but at this point still a fringe government
• Despite the fact that there’s still plenty of opportunity to stop the FO with the help of the Resistance and the Republic fleet, Luke doesn’t even try, and goes into exile, leaving everything behind
• In Luke’s absence the FO grows in power to the point, that it is able to destroy the Republic capital and take over the galaxy
• Luke refuses to help even after his sister Leia through Rey informs him of their situation, and his best friend has been murdered

Except let’s look at what is going on in each instance. In the PT (or even the OT backstory prior to the PT), the Empire has taken over, the Jedi have been hunted down. Ben and Yoda are in hiding. Waiting for something. They have hope that something will change.

Luke has just had his entire new order of Jedi wiped out (either killed or turned to the dark side). We don’t really know how many, but it wasn’t a lot. The facility is wiped out and the leader is none other than his own nephew. He fears that if he trains anyone else, the same thing will happen again. And Snoke and the Knights of Ren make a force that he does not have the power to combat. He would not kill his father in ROTJ so I’m sure he would not kill his nephew.

So the situations are vastly different in terms of what is at stake personally. Also remember, that Ben and Yoda were fully trained Jedi masters. They had learned to put their emotions behind them. When did Luke learn that lesson. We see in ROTJ that he is still prone to letting his emotions take control. He uses that to defeat Vader. As Johnson writes the lines for Luke to speak, he is also addressing fans who have idolized Luke and made him into something that the movies don’t show. The movies never show him attaining true Jedi mastery of his emotions and feelings. And the events that led to his self imposed exile in the ST are ones that, given the character traits shown and mentioned in the OT, would lead him to do exactly what he did. Luke was never perfect, only very determined. He used the Jedi training he had been taught and it failed his padawans. The same way it failed Kenobi in training Anakin. Luke sees that failing but does not know how to correct it. I saw it quite clearly in the PT that Lucas was showing that it wasn’t Kenobi or Yoda who failed, but the Jedi teachings. We are back to that. The Old Republic Jedi order had a major flaw - they didn’t teach their padawan how to avoid the temptation of the dark side. They just said don’t start down that path. They had gotten to a point where they denied attachments because it might lead that way instead of teaching how to avoid and resist the temptation. It is like teaching abstinence instead contraception to avoid teen pregnancies. It doesn’t work. Both Ben Solo and Anakin needed teachings that the Jedi didn’t have and that Luke doesn’t have.

Luke had three choices after Kylo turned. He could go after Kylo Ren and defeat him and the other dark ones. He could build a new order of Jedi to combat them - but the conflict would come eventually and there was no certainty that the new students wouldn’t be cut down or turned like the previous batch. Or he could decide not to kill and go into hiding. Staying and helping Leia really wasn’t an option because Snoke was already there and he would be expected to train new Jedi. And that is what he now fears. Luke rightly sees the Jedi order as flawed. He has given up instead of finding a way to fix it. And if you go back and watch the original, what he did is exactly in keeping with his character traits as established in the OT.

Sorry this really makes no sense to me. Luke refuses to train more Jedi, because he might fail. In stead he allows Snoke to take Ben Solo and to create any number of dark Force users. So, rather than take a risk, which may lead to a victory for the good guys, he opts for certain doom by doing nothing.

If Luke does nothing, the galaxy will be plunged into a second darkness, as there’s nobody to stand in Snoke’s way. If Luke tries to stop Snoke and Kylo, he might prevail, and then retire the Jedi Order, or he might be killed resulting in the end of the Jedi. Doing nothing obvioysly is the worst choice. Luke would be stupid for not being able to deduce this.

This is absolutely not in keeping with Luke’s character, who went on a suicide mission to destroy the Death Star even without significant knowledge of the Force.

Really? Remember in TESB, “I can’t, its too big” of trying to lift his X-wing out of the swamp? And Luke didn’t lead a suicide mission on the death Star. He was one of 30 pilots. And Luke’s failure was huge. He failed Han and Leia, not just Ben and the other students. And with retreat after failure already in him, such a huge setback could easily bring that out again. It is very in keeping with is personality as the OT presented it, though not as the Expended Universe built him up or as many fans have come to see him. This movie really restored humanity to Luke.

Only if you deny Luke’s character development from the moment he failed to lift the X-wing. Discovering Darth Vader is his father, shattered everything Luke believed in. Yet, he overcame it, and ultimately became a Jedi, and redeemed his father.

Additionally the fact that he even for a moment thought about killing his nephew to the point that he activated his lightsaber, when his nephew had done nothing, but be tempted by the dark side, is just not credible. Luke refused to even fight is father, a man who was everything Luke feared his nephew might become and worse. The Luke of ROTJ would have attempted to redeem his nephew, not murder him in his sleep.

Who ignited and swung their saber first? Luke.

After Palpatine had goaded him, and his friends and allies were in real mortal danger. As I stated before ROTJ sets up Luke losing his composure over multiple scenes. TLJ gives us only a single short scene with a Force vision of something that might happen. It’s not the same thing. If TLJ had set up Kylo as being a real danger to Luke’s students, by hurting one of them, it might have worked for me. As it is now Luke’s terrified of a dream, when he kept his cool for a long time in the face of real danger before.

“Terrified of a dream” and not facing any real danger from it is just your interpretation and not supported by anything in the movie.

I think people are underestimating the guilt Luke must’ve felt when Kylo turned. Ben wasn’t just any student, Ben was his nephew, the son of his best friend and sister; and Luke failed him. Luke failed Ben in the worst way a Jedi master can fail. He also failed all of his other students, and they died because of his failure.

EDIT: On top of that, he probably figured that Leia and Han never wanted to see him again. Or, at least, he couldn’t bring himself to face them after what he’d done.

TV’s Frink said:

We don’t even know what he saw. It could have been so bad it was clear there was no saving Ben. Maybe it was a likely future. And he had a moment of weakness, and then he came through it. If you don’t think he can have a one second lapse in judgement, then yes, you think he should be perfect.

The movie should have let us know then. It’s not enough to keep us guessing. If the film wants the the vast majority of viewers to accept Luke’s u-turn, it needs to make us understand what causes Luke to loose his composure like that.

DrDre said:

yotsuya said:

DrDre said:

yotsuya said:

DrDre said:

yotsuya said:

DrDre said:

Warbler said:

Possessed said:

You do make a good point.

I disagree.

What happened to Obi-Wan and Yoda:

• Jedi purge aided by Obi-Wan’s former apprentice now Darth Vader
• Galactic Empire takes over the galaxy
• Yoda and Obi-Wan face off against Sidious and Vader despite terrible odds
• Yoda fights Sidious to a stalemate and is forced to flee, as troops arrive
• Obi-Wan defeats Vader, leaving him for dead
• Obi-Wan and Yoda are now hunted by the Empire, branded traitors with the approval of the Senate, and are forced into hiding
• Obi-Wan and Yoda hide Luke and Leia
• It takes twenty years for the Rebel Alliance to become a significant threat to the Empire’s powerbase
• Leia asks Obi-Wan for help in their most desparate hour, Obi-Wan answers their call

What happened to Luke:

• Luke’s Jedi Academy is destroyed by his former apprentice partly caused by Luke’s unfortunate mistake
• New Republic controls most of the galaxy
• FO is growing in power, but at this point still a fringe government
• Despite the fact that there’s still plenty of opportunity to stop the FO with the help of the Resistance and the Republic fleet, Luke doesn’t even try, and goes into exile, leaving everything behind
• In Luke’s absence the FO grows in power to the point, that it is able to destroy the Republic capital and take over the galaxy
• Luke refuses to help even after his sister Leia through Rey informs him of their situation, and his best friend has been murdered

Except let’s look at what is going on in each instance. In the PT (or even the OT backstory prior to the PT), the Empire has taken over, the Jedi have been hunted down. Ben and Yoda are in hiding. Waiting for something. They have hope that something will change.

Luke has just had his entire new order of Jedi wiped out (either killed or turned to the dark side). We don’t really know how many, but it wasn’t a lot. The facility is wiped out and the leader is none other than his own nephew. He fears that if he trains anyone else, the same thing will happen again. And Snoke and the Knights of Ren make a force that he does not have the power to combat. He would not kill his father in ROTJ so I’m sure he would not kill his nephew.

So the situations are vastly different in terms of what is at stake personally. Also remember, that Ben and Yoda were fully trained Jedi masters. They had learned to put their emotions behind them. When did Luke learn that lesson. We see in ROTJ that he is still prone to letting his emotions take control. He uses that to defeat Vader. As Johnson writes the lines for Luke to speak, he is also addressing fans who have idolized Luke and made him into something that the movies don’t show. The movies never show him attaining true Jedi mastery of his emotions and feelings. And the events that led to his self imposed exile in the ST are ones that, given the character traits shown and mentioned in the OT, would lead him to do exactly what he did. Luke was never perfect, only very determined. He used the Jedi training he had been taught and it failed his padawans. The same way it failed Kenobi in training Anakin. Luke sees that failing but does not know how to correct it. I saw it quite clearly in the PT that Lucas was showing that it wasn’t Kenobi or Yoda who failed, but the Jedi teachings. We are back to that. The Old Republic Jedi order had a major flaw - they didn’t teach their padawan how to avoid the temptation of the dark side. They just said don’t start down that path. They had gotten to a point where they denied attachments because it might lead that way instead of teaching how to avoid and resist the temptation. It is like teaching abstinence instead contraception to avoid teen pregnancies. It doesn’t work. Both Ben Solo and Anakin needed teachings that the Jedi didn’t have and that Luke doesn’t have.

Luke had three choices after Kylo turned. He could go after Kylo Ren and defeat him and the other dark ones. He could build a new order of Jedi to combat them - but the conflict would come eventually and there was no certainty that the new students wouldn’t be cut down or turned like the previous batch. Or he could decide not to kill and go into hiding. Staying and helping Leia really wasn’t an option because Snoke was already there and he would be expected to train new Jedi. And that is what he now fears. Luke rightly sees the Jedi order as flawed. He has given up instead of finding a way to fix it. And if you go back and watch the original, what he did is exactly in keeping with his character traits as established in the OT.

Sorry this really makes no sense to me. Luke refuses to train more Jedi, because he might fail. In stead he allows Snoke to take Ben Solo and to create any number of dark Force users. So, rather than take a risk, which may lead to a victory for the good guys, he opts for certain doom by doing nothing.

If Luke does nothing, the galaxy will be plunged into a second darkness, as there’s nobody to stand in Snoke’s way. If Luke tries to stop Snoke and Kylo, he might prevail, and then retire the Jedi Order, or he might be killed resulting in the end of the Jedi. Doing nothing obvioysly is the worst choice. Luke would be stupid for not being able to deduce this.

This is absolutely not in keeping with Luke’s character, who went on a suicide mission to destroy the Death Star even without significant knowledge of the Force.

Really? Remember in TESB, “I can’t, its too big” of trying to lift his X-wing out of the swamp? And Luke didn’t lead a suicide mission on the death Star. He was one of 30 pilots. And Luke’s failure was huge. He failed Han and Leia, not just Ben and the other students. And with retreat after failure already in him, such a huge setback could easily bring that out again. It is very in keeping with is personality as the OT presented it, though not as the Expended Universe built him up or as many fans have come to see him. This movie really restored humanity to Luke.

Only if you deny Luke’s character development from the moment he failed to lift the X-wing. Discovering Darth Vader is his father, shattered everything Luke believed in. Yet, he overcame it, and ultimately became a Jedi, and redeemed his father.

Additionally the fact that he even for a moment thought about killing his nephew to the point that he activated his lightsaber, when his nephew had done nothing, but be tempted by the dark side, is just not credible. Luke refused to even fight is father, a man who was everything Luke feared his nephew might become and worse. The Luke of ROTJ would have attempted to redeem his nephew, not murder him in his sleep.

Who ignited and swung their saber first? Luke.

After Palpatine had goaded him, and his friends and allies were in real mortal danger. As I stated before ROTJ sets up Luke losing his composure over multiple scenes. TLJ gives us only a single short scene with a Force vision of something that might happen. It’s not the same thing. If TLJ had set up Kylo as being a real danger to Luke’s students, by hurting one of them, it might have worked for me. As it is now Luke’s terrified of a dream, when he kept his cool for a long time in the face of real danger before.

So what you are saying is that because Palpatine threatened and goaded him that is a better reason to act rashly than seeing the depth of the darkness in Kylo Ren - a darkness that evidently bigger than what Luke felt in Vader. And in front of Palpatine and Vader he grabbed, ignighted, and swung his saber and the vision of darkness in Kylo only caused him to draw and ignite his lightsaber and not swing. I think you just proved a big difference in the two scenes.

TV’s Frink said:

We don’t even know what he saw. It could have been so bad it was clear there was no saving Ben. Maybe it was a likely future. And he had a moment of weakness, and then he came through it. If you don’t think he can have a one second lapse in judgement, then yes, you think he should be perfect.

He says he saw the destruction of everything he knew and loved. After 25 years of building and rebuilding the Jedi and the New Republic and reaching that utopia we all imagined happened after ROTJ, it’s easy to understand why he’d be so worried about it all being lost to the dark side once again. He saw killing Ben as a quick and easy solution to that potential disaster (and remember Ben wasn’t totally innocent at this point, he was already under the influence of Snoke so it wasn’t just a vision).

The quick and easy solution is obviously the way of the dark side though, but Luke will always have a bit of the dark side in him, the struggle isn’t just resisting it once and you’re all done. It’s a constant struggle, and in this moment he came just a little too close to not resisting it, and it cost him dearly. I find it a very compelling and human story for a character who should be very compelling and human and yes, imperfect.

DrDre said:

TV’s Frink said:

We don’t even know what he saw. It could have been so bad it was clear there was no saving Ben. Maybe it was a likely future. And he had a moment of weakness, and then he came through it. If you don’t think he can have a one second lapse in judgement, then yes, you think he should be perfect.

The movie should have let us know then. It’s not enough to keep us guessing. If the film wants the the vast majority of viewers to accept Luke’s u-turn, it needs to make us understand what causes Luke to loose his composure like that.

And I think this says it best:

Jeebus said:

I think people are underestimating the guilt Luke must’ve felt when Kylo turned. Ben wasn’t just any student, Ben was his nephew, the son of his best friend and sister; and Luke failed him. Luke failed Ben in the worst way a Jedi master can fail. He also failed all of his other students, and they died because of his failure.

EDIT: On top of that, he probably figured that Leia and Han never wanted to see him again. Or, at least, he couldn’t bring himself to face them after what he’d done.

TV’s Frink said:

DrDre said:

yotsuya said:

DrDre said:

yotsuya said:

DrDre said:

yotsuya said:

DrDre said:

Warbler said:

Possessed said:

You do make a good point.

I disagree.

What happened to Obi-Wan and Yoda:

• Jedi purge aided by Obi-Wan’s former apprentice now Darth Vader
• Galactic Empire takes over the galaxy
• Yoda and Obi-Wan face off against Sidious and Vader despite terrible odds
• Yoda fights Sidious to a stalemate and is forced to flee, as troops arrive
• Obi-Wan defeats Vader, leaving him for dead
• Obi-Wan and Yoda are now hunted by the Empire, branded traitors with the approval of the Senate, and are forced into hiding
• Obi-Wan and Yoda hide Luke and Leia
• It takes twenty years for the Rebel Alliance to become a significant threat to the Empire’s powerbase
• Leia asks Obi-Wan for help in their most desparate hour, Obi-Wan answers their call

What happened to Luke:

• Luke’s Jedi Academy is destroyed by his former apprentice partly caused by Luke’s unfortunate mistake
• New Republic controls most of the galaxy
• FO is growing in power, but at this point still a fringe government
• Despite the fact that there’s still plenty of opportunity to stop the FO with the help of the Resistance and the Republic fleet, Luke doesn’t even try, and goes into exile, leaving everything behind
• In Luke’s absence the FO grows in power to the point, that it is able to destroy the Republic capital and take over the galaxy
• Luke refuses to help even after his sister Leia through Rey informs him of their situation, and his best friend has been murdered

Except let’s look at what is going on in each instance. In the PT (or even the OT backstory prior to the PT), the Empire has taken over, the Jedi have been hunted down. Ben and Yoda are in hiding. Waiting for something. They have hope that something will change.

Luke has just had his entire new order of Jedi wiped out (either killed or turned to the dark side). We don’t really know how many, but it wasn’t a lot. The facility is wiped out and the leader is none other than his own nephew. He fears that if he trains anyone else, the same thing will happen again. And Snoke and the Knights of Ren make a force that he does not have the power to combat. He would not kill his father in ROTJ so I’m sure he would not kill his nephew.

So the situations are vastly different in terms of what is at stake personally. Also remember, that Ben and Yoda were fully trained Jedi masters. They had learned to put their emotions behind them. When did Luke learn that lesson. We see in ROTJ that he is still prone to letting his emotions take control. He uses that to defeat Vader. As Johnson writes the lines for Luke to speak, he is also addressing fans who have idolized Luke and made him into something that the movies don’t show. The movies never show him attaining true Jedi mastery of his emotions and feelings. And the events that led to his self imposed exile in the ST are ones that, given the character traits shown and mentioned in the OT, would lead him to do exactly what he did. Luke was never perfect, only very determined. He used the Jedi training he had been taught and it failed his padawans. The same way it failed Kenobi in training Anakin. Luke sees that failing but does not know how to correct it. I saw it quite clearly in the PT that Lucas was showing that it wasn’t Kenobi or Yoda who failed, but the Jedi teachings. We are back to that. The Old Republic Jedi order had a major flaw - they didn’t teach their padawan how to avoid the temptation of the dark side. They just said don’t start down that path. They had gotten to a point where they denied attachments because it might lead that way instead of teaching how to avoid and resist the temptation. It is like teaching abstinence instead contraception to avoid teen pregnancies. It doesn’t work. Both Ben Solo and Anakin needed teachings that the Jedi didn’t have and that Luke doesn’t have.

Luke had three choices after Kylo turned. He could go after Kylo Ren and defeat him and the other dark ones. He could build a new order of Jedi to combat them - but the conflict would come eventually and there was no certainty that the new students wouldn’t be cut down or turned like the previous batch. Or he could decide not to kill and go into hiding. Staying and helping Leia really wasn’t an option because Snoke was already there and he would be expected to train new Jedi. And that is what he now fears. Luke rightly sees the Jedi order as flawed. He has given up instead of finding a way to fix it. And if you go back and watch the original, what he did is exactly in keeping with his character traits as established in the OT.

Sorry this really makes no sense to me. Luke refuses to train more Jedi, because he might fail. In stead he allows Snoke to take Ben Solo and to create any number of dark Force users. So, rather than take a risk, which may lead to a victory for the good guys, he opts for certain doom by doing nothing.

If Luke does nothing, the galaxy will be plunged into a second darkness, as there’s nobody to stand in Snoke’s way. If Luke tries to stop Snoke and Kylo, he might prevail, and then retire the Jedi Order, or he might be killed resulting in the end of the Jedi. Doing nothing obvioysly is the worst choice. Luke would be stupid for not being able to deduce this.

This is absolutely not in keeping with Luke’s character, who went on a suicide mission to destroy the Death Star even without significant knowledge of the Force.

Really? Remember in TESB, “I can’t, its too big” of trying to lift his X-wing out of the swamp? And Luke didn’t lead a suicide mission on the death Star. He was one of 30 pilots. And Luke’s failure was huge. He failed Han and Leia, not just Ben and the other students. And with retreat after failure already in him, such a huge setback could easily bring that out again. It is very in keeping with is personality as the OT presented it, though not as the Expended Universe built him up or as many fans have come to see him. This movie really restored humanity to Luke.

Only if you deny Luke’s character development from the moment he failed to lift the X-wing. Discovering Darth Vader is his father, shattered everything Luke believed in. Yet, he overcame it, and ultimately became a Jedi, and redeemed his father.

Additionally the fact that he even for a moment thought about killing his nephew to the point that he activated his lightsaber, when his nephew had done nothing, but be tempted by the dark side, is just not credible. Luke refused to even fight is father, a man who was everything Luke feared his nephew might become and worse. The Luke of ROTJ would have attempted to redeem his nephew, not murder him in his sleep.

Who ignited and swung their saber first? Luke.

After Palpatine had goaded him, and his friends and allies were in real mortal danger. As I stated before ROTJ sets up Luke losing his composure over multiple scenes. TLJ gives us only a single short scene with a Force vision of something that might happen. It’s not the same thing. If TLJ had set up Kylo as being a real danger to Luke’s students, by hurting one of them, it might have worked for me. As it is now Luke’s terrified of a dream, when he kept his cool for a long time in the face of real danger before.

“Terrified of a dream” and not facing any real danger from it is just your interpretation and not supported by anything in the movie.

There’s nothing in the film, that suggest Ben Solo presented an immediate threat. Luke suggests Snoke had won Kylo’s heart, but he mentions only dark thoughts, and not a single incident of Ben using the dark side against the other students or himself. If anything the film suggests it was Luke himself who tipped the scale, and caused Ben to go beserk.

yotsuya said:

DrDre said:

yotsuya said:

DrDre said:

yotsuya said:

DrDre said:

yotsuya said:

DrDre said:

Warbler said:

Possessed said:

You do make a good point.

I disagree.

What happened to Obi-Wan and Yoda:

• Jedi purge aided by Obi-Wan’s former apprentice now Darth Vader
• Galactic Empire takes over the galaxy
• Yoda and Obi-Wan face off against Sidious and Vader despite terrible odds
• Yoda fights Sidious to a stalemate and is forced to flee, as troops arrive
• Obi-Wan defeats Vader, leaving him for dead
• Obi-Wan and Yoda are now hunted by the Empire, branded traitors with the approval of the Senate, and are forced into hiding
• Obi-Wan and Yoda hide Luke and Leia
• It takes twenty years for the Rebel Alliance to become a significant threat to the Empire’s powerbase
• Leia asks Obi-Wan for help in their most desparate hour, Obi-Wan answers their call

What happened to Luke:

• Luke’s Jedi Academy is destroyed by his former apprentice partly caused by Luke’s unfortunate mistake
• New Republic controls most of the galaxy
• FO is growing in power, but at this point still a fringe government
• Despite the fact that there’s still plenty of opportunity to stop the FO with the help of the Resistance and the Republic fleet, Luke doesn’t even try, and goes into exile, leaving everything behind
• In Luke’s absence the FO grows in power to the point, that it is able to destroy the Republic capital and take over the galaxy
• Luke refuses to help even after his sister Leia through Rey informs him of their situation, and his best friend has been murdered

Except let’s look at what is going on in each instance. In the PT (or even the OT backstory prior to the PT), the Empire has taken over, the Jedi have been hunted down. Ben and Yoda are in hiding. Waiting for something. They have hope that something will change.

Luke has just had his entire new order of Jedi wiped out (either killed or turned to the dark side). We don’t really know how many, but it wasn’t a lot. The facility is wiped out and the leader is none other than his own nephew. He fears that if he trains anyone else, the same thing will happen again. And Snoke and the Knights of Ren make a force that he does not have the power to combat. He would not kill his father in ROTJ so I’m sure he would not kill his nephew.

So the situations are vastly different in terms of what is at stake personally. Also remember, that Ben and Yoda were fully trained Jedi masters. They had learned to put their emotions behind them. When did Luke learn that lesson. We see in ROTJ that he is still prone to letting his emotions take control. He uses that to defeat Vader. As Johnson writes the lines for Luke to speak, he is also addressing fans who have idolized Luke and made him into something that the movies don’t show. The movies never show him attaining true Jedi mastery of his emotions and feelings. And the events that led to his self imposed exile in the ST are ones that, given the character traits shown and mentioned in the OT, would lead him to do exactly what he did. Luke was never perfect, only very determined. He used the Jedi training he had been taught and it failed his padawans. The same way it failed Kenobi in training Anakin. Luke sees that failing but does not know how to correct it. I saw it quite clearly in the PT that Lucas was showing that it wasn’t Kenobi or Yoda who failed, but the Jedi teachings. We are back to that. The Old Republic Jedi order had a major flaw - they didn’t teach their padawan how to avoid the temptation of the dark side. They just said don’t start down that path. They had gotten to a point where they denied attachments because it might lead that way instead of teaching how to avoid and resist the temptation. It is like teaching abstinence instead contraception to avoid teen pregnancies. It doesn’t work. Both Ben Solo and Anakin needed teachings that the Jedi didn’t have and that Luke doesn’t have.

Luke had three choices after Kylo turned. He could go after Kylo Ren and defeat him and the other dark ones. He could build a new order of Jedi to combat them - but the conflict would come eventually and there was no certainty that the new students wouldn’t be cut down or turned like the previous batch. Or he could decide not to kill and go into hiding. Staying and helping Leia really wasn’t an option because Snoke was already there and he would be expected to train new Jedi. And that is what he now fears. Luke rightly sees the Jedi order as flawed. He has given up instead of finding a way to fix it. And if you go back and watch the original, what he did is exactly in keeping with his character traits as established in the OT.

Sorry this really makes no sense to me. Luke refuses to train more Jedi, because he might fail. In stead he allows Snoke to take Ben Solo and to create any number of dark Force users. So, rather than take a risk, which may lead to a victory for the good guys, he opts for certain doom by doing nothing.

If Luke does nothing, the galaxy will be plunged into a second darkness, as there’s nobody to stand in Snoke’s way. If Luke tries to stop Snoke and Kylo, he might prevail, and then retire the Jedi Order, or he might be killed resulting in the end of the Jedi. Doing nothing obvioysly is the worst choice. Luke would be stupid for not being able to deduce this.

This is absolutely not in keeping with Luke’s character, who went on a suicide mission to destroy the Death Star even without significant knowledge of the Force.

Really? Remember in TESB, “I can’t, its too big” of trying to lift his X-wing out of the swamp? And Luke didn’t lead a suicide mission on the death Star. He was one of 30 pilots. And Luke’s failure was huge. He failed Han and Leia, not just Ben and the other students. And with retreat after failure already in him, such a huge setback could easily bring that out again. It is very in keeping with is personality as the OT presented it, though not as the Expended Universe built him up or as many fans have come to see him. This movie really restored humanity to Luke.

Only if you deny Luke’s character development from the moment he failed to lift the X-wing. Discovering Darth Vader is his father, shattered everything Luke believed in. Yet, he overcame it, and ultimately became a Jedi, and redeemed his father.

Additionally the fact that he even for a moment thought about killing his nephew to the point that he activated his lightsaber, when his nephew had done nothing, but be tempted by the dark side, is just not credible. Luke refused to even fight is father, a man who was everything Luke feared his nephew might become and worse. The Luke of ROTJ would have attempted to redeem his nephew, not murder him in his sleep.

Who ignited and swung their saber first? Luke.

After Palpatine had goaded him, and his friends and allies were in real mortal danger. As I stated before ROTJ sets up Luke losing his composure over multiple scenes. TLJ gives us only a single short scene with a Force vision of something that might happen. It’s not the same thing. If TLJ had set up Kylo as being a real danger to Luke’s students, by hurting one of them, it might have worked for me. As it is now Luke’s terrified of a dream, when he kept his cool for a long time in the face of real danger before.

So what you are saying is that because Palpatine threatened and goaded him that is a better reason to act rashly than seeing the depth of the darkness in Kylo Ren - a darkness that evidently bigger than what Luke felt in Vader. And in front of Palpatine and Vader he grabbed, ignighted, and swung his saber and the vision of darkness in Kylo only caused him to draw and ignite his lightsaber and not swing. I think you just proved a big difference in the two scenes.

No, Luke was trained by Yoda. He knows the future is not set in stone, and that he saw only one possible future. Allways in motion is the future, is what Luke learned, and the audience with him.

Palpatine didn’t just threaten Luke, he was actively annihilating his friends and allies. He’d just demonstrated the power of the fully operational Death Star, and destroyed a number of Alliance ships. Their situation appeared hopeless. This is in no way comparable to a Force vision of a possible future, a future Luke might help prevent.

Let’s break down Luke vs. Vader in RotJ:

• Luke ignites his saber and tries to kill the Emperor after he toyed with Luke’s emotions, which clearly are one of his great weakness and everyone knows it. “Bury your feelings deep down Luke…”
• Vader then defends the Emperor and Luke consumed by rage and hatred viciously attacks him, until he realizes it’s a mistake then he stops.
• Luke refuses to fight Vader, defending and evading only
• Vader teases Luke and triggers Luke by mentioning Leia
• Luke again is consumed by rage but ultimately overcomes the dark side and doesn’t kill his dad.

What did Luke learn?

• That the dark side is overcomeable, because both him and his father did so.
• He has to gain more control over his emotions.

What did we learn in TLJ?

• Luke’s nephew, whom he loves and has known his entire life, is being tempted by the dark side as a teenager.
• Luke then goes to him in the middle of the night and his instincts tell him to kill Ben.

wait what?? what about all of Luke’s failures and how he grew in the OT and all he learned about overcoming darkness? Why isn’t he passing that forward?

He didn’t act like his RotJ self would, but most importantly, like any regular human being that progresses naturally under given circumstances would.

Luke in RotJ only attacked to protect something or someone, but he did it the wrong way, using the dark side.

And how did the Luke that knew that defying all expectations and odds can pay off simply gave up on the galaxy and the ways of the force?

I don’t buy it 😕

DominicCobb said:

TV’s Frink said:

We don’t even know what he saw. It could have been so bad it was clear there was no saving Ben. Maybe it was a likely future. And he had a moment of weakness, and then he came through it. If you don’t think he can have a one second lapse in judgement, then yes, you think he should be perfect.

He says he saw the destruction of everything he knew and loved. After 25 years of building and rebuilding the Jedi and the New Republic and reaching that utopia we all imagined happened after ROTJ, it’s easy to understand why he’d be so worried about it all being lost to the dark side once again. He saw killing Ben as a quick and easy solution to that potential disaster (and remember Ben wasn’t totally innocent at this point, he was already under the influence of Snoke so it wasn’t just a vision).

The quick and easy solution is obviously the way of the dark side though, but Luke will always have a bit of the dark side in him, the struggle isn’t just resisting it once and you’re all done. It’s a constant struggle, and in this moment he came just a little too close to not resisting it, and it cost him dearly. I find it a very compelling and human story for a character who should be very compelling and human and yes, imperfect.

Again ROTJ sets up Luke losing his cool by letting the viewer experience Luke’s struggles, as he witnesses his friends and allies getting killed. TLJ doesn’t do this. It doesn’t even try to show the threat of young Ben Solo, and how Luke came to fear this young boy. Had we witnessed Luke’s vision or had we been given some set up, where we see one of Luke’s student’s get hurt as Kylo gives in to the dark side, we might have better understood Luke’s reaction. However, the movie appears to be mostly interested in showing Luke’s failure in the face of some scary vision, rather than a proper setup.