If only the film didn’t rush into these ideas and communicated them a little more smoothly, I don’t think what is falls apart, they probably drilled all those theoretical holes out with a room full of fact checkers while they tied the last bows, it’s weak on a more emotional level than a betrayal of logic. Like, I can buy Palpatine as this sort of lich wraith whatever if it was presented that way, but the movie doesn’t have enough time for itself so rushed Sheev return becomes awkward Sheev return and it cheapens the ultimate impact.
“The ability to destroy a planet is insignificant next to the power of the Force.” - DV
It’s probably for the best that Lynch didn’t do ROTJ. I can’t imagine Lucas would’ve give him any more creative freedom than he gave Marquand. Lynch’s ROTJ would’ve likely been as tepid a film as the ROTJ we got, only with some minor casting/aesthetic differences.
I kind of wish Cronenberg directed ROTJ, if only for a bit of body horror. Imagine a partially-skeletal Emperor, a distorted Jabba, or a less humanoid Vader.
I know this is completely off-canon but Palpatine in TROS was, to me, more like an extension of the original TESB Emperor with the monkey-eyes. This version didn’t feel like the Naboo Senator gone bad or even the hammy ROTJ guy to me. The idea of the Sith as this secret cult of gothic sorcerers really worked for me too, even if it doesn’t necessarily line up with what has gone before.
I swear, no SW film has messed with my head-canon more than this one! But god I love it…
Yeah, it is pretty interesting and I honestly like the idea! Though it does raises questions, because now the opera scene has a whole new layer of meaning. In the scene, Palpatine seems a little smug about telling the story of how he killed his master (without Anakin realizing), but if all the Banite Sith are one, how does context change for this line, “Ironic, he could save others from death, but not himself.”
You could argue Palpatine is just manipulating Anakin at this point, but that line in particular seems to mean something to Palpatine. Like there is a glimmer in his eye.
There certainly is a glimmer in his eye. It speaks of great pride. It was one of Palpatines finest moments (in his own mind). Also some disappointment in his Master a little I think.
I do not like this idea that all Sith are just Bane. Bad screenwriting 101.
“It is only through interaction, through decision and choice, through confrontation, physical or mental, that the Force can grow within you.”
-Kreia, Jedi Master and Sith Lord
I think it’s pretty ambiguous exactly what the situation is.
I think it’s pretty ambiguous exactly what the situation is.
“That’s what I’m afraid of”.
“It is only through interaction, through decision and choice, through confrontation, physical or mental, that the Force can grow within you.”
-Kreia, Jedi Master and Sith Lord
Did Rey flew Luke’s X-Wing without an astromech droid?
Yes, but I’m assuming the Wayfinder may have fulfilled that need. Luke also reached Ach-To without an astromech, so either that X-Wing doesn’t need an astromech or maybe both Rey and Luke used the Force to guide them. Or a mix of both.
Luke used a Jedi compass to find Ach-To. As explained page 53 of The Rise of Skywalker Visual Dictionary. And the story of how Luke got hold of this Jedi compass is told in one chapter of the solo campaign of the video game Star Wars Battlefront II.
But why and how Luke drew a map to Ach-To, hid one part of this map in R2-D2 and the second part in a USB drive kept by who-was-this-guy hiding on Jakku?
Han: Hey Lando! You kept your promise, right? Not a scratch?
Lando: Well, what’s left of her isn’t scratched. All the scratched parts got knocked off along the way.
Han (exasperated): Knocked off?!
Did Rey flew Luke’s X-Wing without an astromech droid?
Yes, but I’m assuming the Wayfinder may have fulfilled that need. Luke also reached Ach-To without an astromech, so either that X-Wing doesn’t need an astromech or maybe both Rey and Luke used the Force to guide them. Or a mix of both.
Luke used a Jedi compass to find Ach-To. As explained page 53 of The Rise of Skywalker Visual Dictionary. And the story of how Luke got hold of this Jedi compass is told in one chapter of the solo campaign of the video game Star Wars Battlefront II.
But why and how Luke drew a map to Ach-To, hid one part of this map in R2-D2 and the second part in a USB drive kept by who-was-this-guy hiding on Jakku?
There’s another thread where we’re discussing this exact topic. According to Abrams, R2 inadvertently downloaded the Ach To map from the first Death Star. Lor San Tekka was a member of the Church of the Force, so I’m guessing their map fragment was something they had in their possession. He’s also supposed to be a former explorer, so maybe he found it in a Jedi temple years ago. The map is supposed to be a map to Ach To that was created long ago, it’s not something that Luke made. None of this is made clear in the films.
The fact that we even need to dive this deep for explanations through art books and lore really bums me out.
“The ability to destroy a planet is insignificant next to the power of the Force.” - DV
The fact that we even need to dive this deep for explanations through art books and lore really bums me out.
Me too. I was really hoping for better storytelling than this.
The fact that we even need to dive this deep for explanations through art books and lore really bums me out.
Me too. I was really hoping for better storytelling than this.
It’s not really important to the story though. Would the movies really be better if they told us in excruciating detail how he found the Jedi Temple? Expanded materials are the perfect place for those kind of explanations in my opinion.
A lot’s been said abut the similarities between this movie and the Dark Empire comics, but today it occurred to me that the whole secret-armada-in-the-Unknown-Regions bit is very Dark Force Rising. And the Death Star guns on Star Destroyers is more than a little Darksaber. I think it might be fun to catalog all the recycled Legends elements in this film.
A lot’s been said abut the similarities between this movie and the Dark Empire comics, but today it occurred to me that the whole secret-armada-in-the-Unknown-Regions bit is very Dark Force Rising. And the Death Star guns on Star Destroyers is more than a little Darksaber. I think it might be fun to catalog all the recycled Legends elements in this film.
Terrio is supposedly an EU fan so it makes sense.
The fact that we even need to dive this deep for explanations through art books and lore really bums me out.
Me too. I was really hoping for better storytelling than this.
It’s not really important to the story though. Would the movies really be better if they told us in excruciating detail how he found the Jedi Temple? Expanded materials are the perfect place for those kind of explanations in my opinion.
One line of dialogue is excruciating detail?
I seem to be in the minority of viewers by thinking the movie establishes that Leia knew about Rey’s parentage but Luke did not. Did anyone else form that inference?
Luke seems completely unfamiliar with her in TLJ, so I figured this was how they weave this plot point into the existing material.
Luke did cut himself off from the Force while Leia never did. That could be a factor.
The Rise of Failures
I’ve been trying to develop a headcanon to make this movie’s Snoke stuff less ridiculous in the wider continuity. Here’s where I’m at.
First of all, Palpatine’s line, “I made Snoke,” gives the immediate impression that Snoke came fully-formed out of a tank, because the next thing we see is the tank with another Snoke in it. The line itself doesn’t have to be that literal, though; it could just as easily mean “I made Snoke what he was,” i.e. he corrupted an existing individual. My preferred version of events is that Snoke was a dark side adept who went exploring in the Unknown Regions, stumbled across Exogol, and was bent to Palpatine’s will. I don’t hold out much hope for this to be canonized, but it remains plausible at this point.
If Palpatine did literally engineer Snoke, though, I’d prefer if it wasn’t for the explicit purpose of fronting the First Order after the OT, because that either means that Snoke was doing nothing for decades, or that he’s actually roughly the same age as Ben Solo. I prefer to think that Palpatine employed Snoke as an administrator for the Sith Eternal cult in the Unknown Regions, and that Snoke in some capacity oversaw the creation of the Sith fleet. I like this version of events because it leaves the door open for some PT-era Snoke stuff in Zahn’s upcoming trilogy about Thrawn in the Unknown Regions.
What about the new Snokes in the vats in the opening of TROS, though? I think that if Kylo Ren hadn’t found Exogol, Palpatine would have sent another Snoke out into the galaxy to sow doubt about whether he’d truly been killed. Palpatine’s strategy has never been based around a single master plan; he prefers to set up a series of contingencies and failsafes so that he comes out ahead no matter what happens. Those Snokes are on ice just in case they become useful later. That’s why they have the injuries that we know Snoke received relatively recently as of the time of the ST; it’s not to suggest that the original Snoke was designed to look all melted and fucked up, it’s because the new Snokes are meant to replace Snoke prime and need to match him.
I don’t know, it’s all pretty dumb no matter how you look at it, but I’ll feel a lot better if they canonize some degree of agency/significance/history for Snoke. Apart from the few bars of Palpatine’s theme that play when Snoke is interrogating Rey in TLJ, there isn’t a whiff of the “man behind the curtain” trope throughout the rest of the ST, and it feels really sloppy and flippant to say in the third film that the big bad in the first two was a literal puppet and not go into any further detail.
I agree. Just remove those shots or replace the contents with cloned Palpatines or something else.
The head canon for me is simple. There’s nothing in the film that says Snoke was a literal puppet. Even if he’s a clone, there’s not much reason for me to think he couldn’t have his own agency.
I think it would be ironic if in future canon material Snoke turned out to be Plagueis’ failed attempts at cloning a host body for himself once he died, so he didn’t have to jump into another apprentice once that time came. But, Palpatine eventually did kill Plagueis and discovered his master’s failed experiments.
Then after Palpatine’s “death”, Palpatine made use of his master’s clone bodies as puppets until he could remove the incorruptible Luke and his Jedi from the picture.
If a clone body can’t host a Force spirit, then it would explain why they just reanimated Palpatine’s own corpse instead of cloning him a fresh body.
I like the idea of Snoke being a puppet, because the imagery is already there. Think of how Snoke moves Rey around like a puppet on a string.
And also, not directly related, but the line, “tied on the end of a string”. Maybe I’m grasping for straws, or should I say strings? There’s also a lot of parallels between Snoke and Oz, the massive holograms, the giant curtain in his throne room. And Palpatine is the Man Behind the Curtain.
If Palpatine used the voice of his apprentice to manipulate young Ben, it’d also make sense for him to use the voice of his master. I think it’s fitting. And to me the line, “I have been every voice you’ve ever heard inside your head” implies that Sidious did in fact control Snoke.
Just make Sheev & Snoke jilted ex-lovers.
Because apparently Lucasfilm & Disney considered making this film even MORE of a cash-grab cliché by doing the Harry Potter two-part finale thing.
“That Darth Vader, man. Sure does love eating Jedi.”
Because apparently Lucasfilm & Disney considered making this film even MORE of a cash-grab cliché by doing the Harry Potter two-part finale thing.
I actually wished they had went this route. Especially considering the finished product’s rushed pacing.
I think they could have made the Star Destroyer break in the finale of Ep 9 and used Rey’s parentage as the big twist to bring us in for 10.
That would have been awful. They should have tried to write for a single film instead of trying to cram as much in as possible (and then cut it down to a runtime that is clearly too short for everything going on).
Maybe if they didn’t waste so much time reintroducing Palpatine they wouldn’t have needed two parts!
Maybe if they didn’t waste so much time reintroducing Palpatine they wouldn’t have needed two parts!
??? They don’t spend any time introducing him. They instantly bring him into the plot, don’t give any time for the characters to reflect on his arrival, and expect you to watch a fortnite clip to understand.