Would you say ROTJ undermined ESB with its retcon of the “there is another” sequel hook?
I would say yes. It’s not really dealt with in a way that is satisfactory or satisfying.
“Leia’s a Skywalker. 'Nuff said.” We don’t get to see her character grow and develop her powers after the revelation that she has some in Empire. We get to see her in a gold bikini and she plays with teddy bears.
I would say that undermines her character and how it was established in Empire and hence the film itself.
I agree that Leia is underutilized in ROTJ (and that the bikini undermines her character) but I don’t think making her a Skywalker is the root of that problem. And retconning Yoda’s line doesn’t undermine all of ESB, it just reorients a one-off line. It’s far more blatant a redirect than anything people claim of TLJ, but it’s still kind of a “who cares” change, it doesn’t matter all that much in the grand scheme of the story.
I think most people’s problem with Leia being the other is more a problem of Leia being Luke’s sister, which serves to shrink the universe and make the love triangle of SW and ESB squicky. I can’t think of anything in TLJ that does anything like that at all.
I’m not going to try and argue that TLJ completely undermines TFA, because I don’t think that’s the case at all. But one such example (which is the only one I can really think of) is how TLJ picks up the final scene (the final few shots, really) of TFA.
In TFA, that final moment is treated with complete seriousness and has real gravity to it, enforced both by the score and by Mark Hamill’s small, but effective performance. TLJ unabashedly pulls the rug out from under it, treats it flippantly and plays it for a laugh, which to my mind undermines the seriousness of that scene in TFA. It also undermines Hamill’s performance in TFA. No wonder he didn’t like Johnson’s vision for Luke.
I mean this is pretty much the only scene where I get people thinking TLJ pulled a 180 on TFA, but I still don’t see it as undermining or causing an inconsistency. It’s basically just coming at it from a different angle. The two different scenes serve very different purposes. As the ending of TFA, the dramatic weight of the scene is such in order to suggest the immensity of the events that have occurred and will eventually follow, which is necessary as the ending moment of the film.
The fact that the moment is built up to be of such momentous proportions is still very important to the story of TLJ (whether the scene itself is portrayed differently or not). The scene in TFA is basically from Rey’s perspective, her whole life and the whole film has been leading up to this point, now she’s putting her faith in this Legend to save everyone. But with TLJ, we see things from the other side. The legend who doesn’t feel like a legend, wondering who this person is, tossing aside this weapon that has caused him such pain (in this regard, Hamill’s weary TFA performance still tracts).
But here’s the important thing. For TLJ to “undermine” this TFA scene, it would have to have ignored it’s portrayal and meaning entirely. TFA positions finding Skywalker as finding the last hope for the galaxy. And though Luke at the beginning of TLJ refuses, by the end of the film he has fulfilled the promise of Rey’s journey and offer. So comparing the final scene of TFA solely to its repeated scene in TLJ misses completely the scene it’s actually anticipating, Luke’s return on Crait (which tonally fits very well with TFA’s finale).
Aside from that example I wouldn’t say that TLJ undermines its predecessor. But there’s definitely a tonal dissonance between the two films. It’s not hard to spot and I think that’s part of why so many people were turned off by TLJ.
I honestly struggle to spot this “tonal dissonance.” The two films are tonally different of course, but I don’t really think any moreso than any other two SW films are from each other. Some say it has too much humor, but weren’t people saying TFA had too much humor, too? Aren’t they similar in that regard?