The Force Awakens: Official Review Thread - ** SPOILERS ** — Page 19

TavorX said:

Warbler said:
“if my idiot brother hadn’t left, maybe Han might still be alive. My brother was able to turn my father of all people back to the light, why in hell didn’t he at least try with my son! Due to him stupidly leaving, both my lover is dead and my son is probably too far gone to be saved! I am so angry with him I almost want to turn to the darkside, become a sith and hunt him down myself!”

That sounds kinda too dramatic in all honesty. There has been 30 years here that we’re not fully aware of. I’m pretty sure Luke did all he could in his power to make Ben see the light but failed due to the overpowering influence of Snoke on Ben. Blaming Luke for Han’s death is just too unfair I wouldn’t see Leia doing that. Leia has fought in the Galactic Civil War. She has seen her homeworld destroyed. Leia knows death very well. I’m not implying Leia feels nothing. I’m just saying Leia probably sees Han as a thankful temporary happinees in her life. He’s gone and nothing is going to change that, and again, death isn’t some new thing to Leia to experience.

true, there are 30 years we’re not fully aware of, but we know enough. A Dark Jedi is on the loose and the only known trained Jedi goes into hiding. The more I think of it, the asinine it becomes. Yeah maybe tried to turn him and failed. But if Luke couldn’t turn him back, do you really think it wise for Luke to just disappear? How about stopping him? If Rey could defeat Kylo Ren, in their fight, I would have difficult believing that Luke wouldn’t have been able to easily either capture or kill him. But Luke just disappears and lets Kylo Ren terrorize the Galaxy and kill many innocent people. Makes no sense.

Warbler said:

btw anyone think it curious how similar the names of the bad guy and good girl are? Rey and Ren?

I noticed, too, when we started using Ren as shorthand here. But Ren is some kind of order that he belongs to (Knights of Ren), using the personal name Kylo. His real name, of course, is Ben.

I feel like the movie could have been better if the whole “thermal oscillator” thing turned out to be misleading, and they had to find another way to destroy it. It would have been even better if Finn had begun a stormtrooper uprising and helped destroy/disable the base from the inside (there must be other stormtroopers that think the same way he does–he might even know some).

I feel like the shields were disabled too easily, and the thermal oscillator was destroyed to easily, and the whole planet was blown up too easily.

I also think this movie should have been split into three movies:

Episode VII:
We meet the new cast. We are given some more time to get to know them so that we care about them more towards the end. We actually find out how big the Resistance and the First Order are so we get a better idea of the stakes. The existence of Starkiller Base is revealed, and the base is attacked while the Rebels evacuate their planet. They lose the final battle, and their planet is destroyed. Han convinces Ren to come with him. Luke is found to be absent from the planet at the end, but he leaves a clue.

Episode VIII:
Finn goes undercover to win stormtroopers over to his side. This is kept top secret, and not even Rey knows. Together they discover how to destroy Starkiller Base. Rey, Poe, and Ren search for Luke, and Ren trains Rey. The attack is made on Starkiller base. As Ren, Rey, and Poe storm the base together, Ren turns on them, revealing that he was acting as a double agent all along. He also reveals that Rey is Luke’s daughter. Rey fights and eventually defeats him, though thanks to him, the Resistance suffers heavy losses. Ren was kept ignorant of the fact that Finn was on the base, and it is through a surprise stormtrooper rebellion that Starkiller Base is finally disabled, with help from the Resistance. The Resistance either take control of Starkiller base or are faced with the challenge of evacuating all the stormtroopers on their side.

Episode IX:
There would be ethical problems raised by the Resistance’s control of Starkiller Base. The search for Luke continues, and the trail he leaves seems to be leading in circles. The search for Snoke is also ongoing. Rey has been having visions, and they eventually lead her to Luke’s hiding place. She goes to find Luke but something is wrong. Then she discovers why–Luke is Snoke. He captures her, but is unsure what to do with her. Meanwhile, the Resistance has discovered where Snoke is, but are unwilling to attack until they find Luke.

From there, there are a number of ways it could play out, some of them better than others. Maybe Luke/Snoke could end up killing himself when faced with the choice of killing Rey and/or Han and Leia. Maybe Rey could join him, but then turn on him in the end.

That’s still a bit too much like the OT, but I tried to roughly follow what has been set up so far.

It’s also not really that good, but I would have preferred to see some of those ideas. It would also have spread things out more, which is one of things I feel really should have been done. Maybe that’s just me, though. I’m glad most people enjoyed the movie more than I did. Maybe things will start to fall in place in the next movie, and I’ll enjoy that one more…

Although I’m not sure I like the idea of Snoke being Luke for the reason that it kind of undoes what he accomplished in the OT. It would be better if Snoke were Leia, and that was the real reason he went into hiding–he didn’t want to confront her.

TavorX said:

To be completely honest, Snoke being Luke or Leia sounds… really cringey and cheesy. I would take Darth Plageuis = Snoke over that.

But I’d rather Snoke be a new character with a different agenda.

I think you’re right about that. It could also be interesting if Snoke was the ghost of the Emperor…except that that might be extremely lame as well.

SilverWook said:

One thing I didn’t realize was being shown in Rey’s vision was Kylo and his men killing Jedi. Those were probably all the ones Luke had trained since ROTJ, and they’ve been wiped out. Luke putting his hand on Artoo was probably after he discovers this. He doesn’t just feel the pain of failing with Ren, he’s lost an entire generation of new Jedi. That’s a terrible burden to bear.

The fact that it was a flashback passed me by for some reason. I thought it was a vision of the future, but realized by the end of the movie that that didn’t make a lot of sense.

I’m feeling more or less the same way. I didn’t expect Abrams to nail it, but I did expect him to get closer to doing so than he did.

To be honest, I don’t like the idea of there being someone like Snoke to begin with, which is part of why I didn’t work him into my alternate storyline very well.

That could have been interesting. It would also explain why Kylo was so inept when fighting with Rey and Finn…

To me, Snoke seems too much of a rehash of the Emperor at this point. We’ll see how it plays out, though.

How has luke been training others for 30 odd year or fighting without a light sabre?

woofermazing said:

I think you guys are mistaken about Rey being hidden from Ren. I think it’s more likely that Ren is the one who dumped her on Jakku. Ren was Lukes star pupil and likely successor to lead the new Jedi order. Then baby Skywalker is born and is a force prodigy. Ren is pissy about being cast aside and hooks up with Snoke. He’s ordered to wipe out the Jedi order and bring the Skywalker child to Snoke. He decides to kill her instead because he doesn’t want to be second fiddle again but can’t follow through, so instead ditches her on a random planet. She doesn’t remember any of this yet.

Kylo Rens reaction to hearing about the Jakku escape and fear when she starts to realize her force powers make no sense unless they have history, and his inferiority complex makes no sense unless he’s been cast aside before in favor of Rey. It also would completely ruin Luke’s character for me if he abandoned Rey to the same life he had been stuck in, and then gave up fighting for good.

I really like this as a possible explanation.

hydrospanner said:

woofermazing said:

I think you guys are mistaken about Rey being hidden from Ren. I think it’s more likely that Ren is the one who dumped her on Jakku. Ren was Lukes star pupil and likely successor to lead the new Jedi order. Then baby Skywalker is born and is a force prodigy. Ren is pissy about being cast aside and hooks up with Snoke. He’s ordered to wipe out the Jedi order and bring the Skywalker child to Snoke. He decides to kill her instead because he doesn’t want to be second fiddle again but can’t follow through, so instead ditches her on a random planet. She doesn’t remember any of this yet.

Kylo Rens reaction to hearing about the Jakku escape and fear when she starts to realize her force powers make no sense unless they have history, and his inferiority complex makes no sense unless he’s been cast aside before in favor of Rey. It also would completely ruin Luke’s character for me if he abandoned Rey to the same life he had been stuck in, and then gave up fighting for good.

I really like this as a possible explanation.

There’s also the novelization. When the lightsaber whizzes by Kylo and into Rey’s hand, he thinks “It is you”.

That was my favorite easter egg in the entire movie-- seeing Rey in the corridor on Bespin.

That beautiful shot made me tear up a little.

For all the hate I’m giving the movie, it’s moments like that, and the pursuit of the Falcon on Jakku, and so many other moments with Rey, that show the film could have been something special, continuing the legacy of the OT.

It’s disheartening that the good parts got ****** up by all the missteps.