As for “subverting expectations,” I think people read to much into that to mean Johnson was trying to annoy fans at every turn or something.
I wonder where they got that idea?
Not pointing Luke specifically, just the story. I guess you could argue that the final scene in TFA has the weight of the Luke we know from the OT, but you could argue just as easily that it leads just as well into TLJ’s version of Luke so it’s a wash, really.
Luke we already know as an established character by the end of ROTJ. The Luke we see in TLJ just plainly isn’t the same character. You can classify it as “growth” or “character development” or whatever, but it’s not really an expansion of the Luke character we’ve seen before as it is a complete alteration of the core character. It was like a “what if” version of Luke where maybe he failed to defeat the Emperor and redeem his father and fell into despair or something. The whole movie kinda felt like a “what if” thing.
I completely disagree of course. Luke has always been my favorite character and I’m glad they gave him a compelling story rather than just “perfect old Jedi who exiled himself to learn the bestest powers.”
And Mark Hamill completely disagrees with you. Funny how that works.