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The Rise of Skywalker SPOILERS ALLOWED discussion thread


Jay

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1 hour ago, Pieter Boelen said:

And it also didn't play with Rey's parentage, which I thought was the best possible option too.

 

See, this is where I'm on two minds. When I first saw The Force Awakens, the thought that Rey had any significant lineage didn't even cross my mind. It was clear that the glimpses we got into her past weren't meant to setup some lineage, but merely as a sob-story intended to make her journey that much more of a rags-to-riches one: starting an orphaned scavengers on a desolate planet, only to become a Jedi.

 

Therefore, going into The Last Jedi, when Rian Johnson started asking (rather late in the game) who Rey's parents were, I knew he was going to land on the conclusion that they were nobody. But instead of just doing it, he made a big buildup about it, clearly intending for the reveal to be a surprising shock. That's what I call a low-hanging fruit. But then, here comes JJ Abrams and says Rey is indeed related to a legacy character, so maybe it wasn't really such a low hanging fruit?

 

I dunno.

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1 hour ago, Demodex said:

So for the people that didn't like TLJ, is this movie even worse despite it trying to appease the fans?

 

No, TRoS is definitely not worse than TLJ for me. TLJ really screwed things up; after TLJ, it’s hard to care about any new “Star Wars” things they put out.

 

TRoS is like Solo, in that it seems like a movie we “didn’t need” but at least they gave us enough fun bits to make it worth a watch. There’s nothing to hate. Just enjoy and forget.

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36 minutes ago, Chen G. said:

Therefore, going into The Last Jedi, when Rian Johnson started asking (rather late in the game) who Rey's parents were, I knew he was going to land on the conclusion that they were nobody. But instead of just doing it, he made a big buildup about it, clearly intending for the reveal to be a surprising shock. That's what I call a low-hanging fruit. But then, here comes JJ Abrams and says Rey is indeed related to a legacy character, so maybe it wasn't really such a low hanging fruit?

Based on just the movies, indeed I agree with you there.

The question of Rey's parentage was never very relevant in TFA at all.

Almost a complete non-issue, as far as I'm concerned.

 

But then the fandom and the JJ Mystery Box come in.

And with the "Skywalker everywhere", suddenly it gets blown far out of proportion.

 

When it never needed to be.

Because why wouldn't it be a BIG galaxy?

It's a whole GALAXY, for crying out loud!

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1 hour ago, Demodex said:

So for the people that didn't like TLJ, is this movie even worse despite it trying to appease the fans?  Or is it a lot better because of, uh, reasons?


I hate TLJ. Yes, I thought TROS was better. Not much better mind you, but better. I consider both to be bad films, but this one was at least fun at times. The score’s more interesting to me too. I’d certainly take TROS concert suite over The Rebellion Is Reborn any day.

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2 hours ago, Demodex said:

So for the people that didn't like TLJ, is this movie even worse despite it trying to appease the fans?  Or is it a lot better because of, uh, reasons?

 

For the people that loved TLJ, is this movie a success or disappointment?

 

Someone should make a poll. 

 

I had immense problems with TLJ. TROS makes it look like a masterpiece.

 

10 minutes ago, Pellaeon said:

Well, I’m sorry to disagree about the Rey mystery.

 

In TFA, Rey herself is clearly wondering about her parentage the whole time. Yes, Maz tells her to let it go and to look to Luke Skywalker instead. And that gets her through the film. However, the mystery of her parentage was obviously going to be an ongoing motivator for the character. In other words, the character was never not going to care, therefore the audience was meant to speculate about it.*

 

Second, again in TFA, Rey displays fully-formed Force abilities without training (that we know of). Some people decried this as Mary Sueism; personally, I gave her the benefit of the doubt because I thought the sequels might provide an explanation. Which I don’t know if they have—having Palpatine for a grandfather isn’t enough in and of itself (lineage has been established as affecting space-magic propensity/sensitivity, but not bestowing superpowers per se). Are we meant to understand that she is leeching off Kylo Ren through the whole Force Dyad business?

 

* - and honestly, I hate the idea that the audience is to blame for speculating about stuff. That post-TFA fandom was a very energetic and fun one, fueled in no small part by all the speculating and theories. I really doubt most people will be butthurt about their theories being proved false, as long as the movie is good.

 

Allow me to disagree with the disagreement. Why is parentage an interesting concept? It is the most parochial patriarchal colonial 19th century idea of them all. It used to be a plot driver in Victorian novels.

 

Why today in the 21st century do we give a flying fuck about parentage? We as a civilization have completed transcrended that. Your parentage matters fuck all. In no context is it important.

 

I have nothing in common with my parents and my parents don't define who I am or will become or want to be. It is a very daft and quaint concept.

 

For JJ to construct his trilogy around parentage is incredibly backwards and regressive. Seriously dude (addressing JJ here), who the fuck cares?

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11 minutes ago, Pellaeon said:

honestly, I hate the idea that the audience is to blame for speculating about stuff. That post-TFA fandom was a very energetic and fun one, fueled in no small part by all the speculating and theories.

Fair enough; it CAN be fun.

And indeed for a while, I followed along and it was.

 

12 minutes ago, Pellaeon said:

I really doubt most people will be butthurt about their theories being proved false, as long as the movie is good.

Agreed; I don't believe most people were like that either.

Only some of them. Some very vocal ones. :(

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14 minutes ago, gkgyver said:

JJ Abrams made The Force Awakens, and wrote story outlines for VIII and IX. 

Rian Johnson came in and was given permission to do whatever the hell he wanted, and instead of being a director conscious of the responsibility, he threw Abrams' outline

 

There's no evidence for this.

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1 hour ago, Chen G. said:

 

There's no evidence for this.

 

"I believe Rian didn’t keep anything from the first draft of Episode VIII."

 

https://www.denofgeek.com/uk/movies/star-wars/55771/star-wars-rian-johnson-scrapped-jj-abrams-episode-viii-script

 

Took me 30 seconds to find. 

 

Unless of course the lead actor of the film doesn't count as a source. 

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47 minutes ago, gkgyver said:

TLJ is written as a finale. Finn and Rose end up kissing in a dramatic way, Finn beats Phasma, Rey and Kylo kill Snoke. Rey comes to the aid of Leia as a powerful Jedi. 

Killing off both Phasma and Snoke, and killing off Luke Skywalker as a bitter hermit, left Episode IX with almost nothing. 

In a way, indeed that is true.

And in a way, that was a GOOD thing.

 

Like @Holko says, that allowed the next film in the series enough freedom to NOT remake RotJ.

To maybe skip on the Rey's parentage and the superweapons and the old villains.

And instead focus on what exactly this series truly wanted to leave behind as its final, undiluted core message.

 

As it is, I honestly don't know what TROS was trying to say.

It seemed to be too busy regurgitating the past to say much of anything.

 

The one message I remember liking is "evil wins by making us believe we're alone, even though we're not".

That's one I would very much wish would stick in people's minds.

 

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18 minutes ago, Chen G. said:

 

Sounds like bollocks to me. I'll believe it when I see the actual drafts.

 

Well that's convenient. 

Great logic. 

I don't believe Williams wrote 3 hours of music for Episode IX unless I see the actual sheet music. 

 

George Lucas wrote stories for the sequel trilogy among other SW stories, sold those to Disney, they got thrown out, Abrams was hired, and he did an outline for the whole trilogy, because no sane director makes the first part of a planned trilogy without having a plan. 

End of story. 

34 minutes ago, Holko said:

If anything, it was too open-ended, letting the followup do almost anything!

 

Wrong. TLJ left the protagonists without a story arc. Finn defeated his nemesis, got the girl, Luke died, Rey discovered her Jedi powers, the head of the First Order Snoke died. 

The consensus after TLJ was that everybody wondered where Episode IX would go with 2/3 of the villains dead. 

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33 minutes ago, gkgyver said:

The consensus after TLJ was that everybody wondered where Episode IX would go with 2/3 of the villains dead. 

And even more than 2/3rd of the heroes dead.

 

There were so few characters left that in 2 hours, a lot could be done with them.

There was even space to focus on character over spectacle, for a less visually epic, but more thoughtful finale instead.

 

And wasn't it exciting to NOT know where things were headed?

To truly venture into the unknown?

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Ugh, I don’t want to step into this trainwreck, but....

4 hours ago, gkgyver said:

Literally burned the Jedi history

 
He literally burned a tree.  The books from the tree were in the Falcon at the end of TLJ and Rey uses them in TROS.

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5 hours ago, gkgyver said:

Destroys hyperspace. 

Thought TFA already did that with its "jump from zero to hyperspace" and the other way around in one movie.

 

Actually, that is something I could've done without altogether.

The amount of "playing with simple travel" was quite excessive in the entire ST.

 

The only part I like is that, in the moment at least, the effect of the Holdo manoeuvre is quite stunning.

 

30 minutes ago, mstrox said:

He literally burned a tree.  The books from the tree were in the Falcon at the end of TLJ and Rey uses them in TROS.

Exactly.

Plus, those books were introduced in the very same movie.

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26 minutes ago, Holko said:

TROS breaks hyperspace much more with that skipping thing being basically teleporting, but then never really brings it up again. I think.

 

There was that whole thing about how Lando and Chewie were going to swing through the core systems, put together a supermassive fleet, and pop over to the Unknown Regions just in the nick of time (i.e., it’s not like they had a head start).

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2 hours ago, gkgyver said:

Well that's convenient. 

Great logic

 

She says Abrams wrote THREE SCRIPTS - not just an outline. Thats' preposterous. If Disney had three scripts all ready to go, they would have shot the damn thing in one go and saved a lot of money.

 

That they didn't tells you all you need to know.

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Well, I loved TLJ and it's my favorite SW movie other than ANH and ESB. 

 

I don't think TROS is a bad movie like TPM or AOTC are, but I feel like there were missed opportunities.  At least it's little more original than TFA, but it's my least favorite of the ST. 

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5 hours ago, Demodex said:

 

So?  That made it better. 

 

It really doesn't. People who gauge movie quality based on gender or on how many and which ethnicities are cast, are really disturbing. 

If it makes a movie better or worse for you based on what color or sex the actors have, that's blatantly racist and sexist. 

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10 minutes ago, gkgyver said:

 

It really doesn't. People who gauge movie quality based on gender or on how many and which ethnicities are cast, are really disturbing. 

If it makes a movie better or worse for you based on what color or sex the actors have, that's blatantly racist and sexist. 

 

😄😄😄😄  

 

I'm sorry. That's hysterical coming from someone with that person as their profile pic. 

 

Anyway, I was glad to see some diversity in the cast. 

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20 minutes ago, gkgyver said:

 

It really doesn't. People who gauge movie quality based on gender or on how many and which ethnicities are cast, are really disturbing. 

If it makes a movie better or worse for you based on what color or sex the actors have, that's blatantly racist and sexist. 

Real life is diverse.

Having more representation only makes sense.

 

Ideally we would live in a world where it doesn't matter one way or another.

And yet here we are, talking about it.

Apparently it matters.

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30 minutes ago, Pieter Boelen said:

Ideally we would live in a world where it doesn't matter one way or another.

 

 

Its a complex subject, but the short of it is no, it doesn't matter: the western ideal is freedom for the individual. A cast can be predominatly white male and still be perfectly egalitarian.

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20 minutes ago, Chen G. said:

 

Its a complex subject, but the short of it is no, it doesn't matter: the western ideal is freedom for the individual. A cast can be predominatly white male and still be perfectly egalitarian.

That's the ideal, yes.

We don't live up to it.

 

Freedom isn't all it's made out to be anyway.

Not when my freedom interferes with yours.

 

For me, the ideal would be "live and let live".

And I like to believe most people would agree; at least in words.

 

In actions though?

That's a different story...

 

It's easier said than done.

And we have a lot yet to learn.

 

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There 'story' of the sequel trilogy, such as there is, is really misbegotten.

 

Literally the only single decesion that I can   endorse wholeheartedly is having a female protagonist. Rest everything else is questionable.

 

At the end of it all, I am curious to see what George Lucas' outline was.

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Wasn't it to do with midichlorians? Conceptually, I think I prefer what we've got, thank you very much.

 

Besides, I bet this "outline" was very rudimentary: probably more focused on the first film, with vague ideas for the other two. Even in the prequel trilogy, Lucas' "outline" was clearly not very comprehensive, as it still resulted in a lopsided, fractured trilogy.

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5 hours ago, Romão said:

I really cannot agree with the sentiment that TLJ left ROTS nowhere to go. I really cannot. 

 

Apparently, it left it with anywhere to go, so we got the immediate plot twist that Palpatine is a reanimated corpse attached to a crane with a secret army and Snokes growing in a tank. How they always intended it to end!

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Ok, I finally saw it.  Not as bad as I thought it would be.  I think it ranks in the middle of the pack.  No, I haven't read any post in this thread but I can guess the criticisms are that this story causes problems with previous stories and in some cases undermines major accomplishments.  Such is what we get when we lose a singular vision and end up with story by committee.  However, I feel JJ had so many obstacles stacked up against him and did a reasonably good (not great) job dealing with those. 

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2 hours ago, Chen G. said:

 

Its a complex subject, but the short of it is no, it doesn't matter: the western ideal is freedom for the individual. A cast can be predominatly white male and still be perfectly egalitarian.

 

It's really not that complex of a subject. Indian productions feature predominantly Indian people, Chinese productions feature predominantly chinese people, European productions predominantly feature European people, and Anglo American productions feature predominantly Anglo American people. Because that's what the majority of the respective population identifies with.

 

Put people in your films as you see fit for the role and the movie, and don't have token ethnicities and characters in there to please people that have nothing better to do than scour the world for outrage.

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2 hours ago, Chen G. said:

Wasn't it to do with midichlorians? Conceptually, I think I prefer what we've got, thank you very much.

 

Besides, I bet this "outline" was very rudimentary: probably more focused on the first film, with vague ideas for the other two. Even in the prequel trilogy, Lucas' "outline" was clearly not very comprehensive, as it still resulted in a lopsided, fractured trilogy.

 

I would say the prequels are vastly more original in scope, tell a much larger story on a much grander scale and there are actually massive universe changing events and real stakes. You get none of that in the sequels. It feels like a tiny sideshow by comparison.

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53 minutes ago, TheUlyssesian said:

 

I would say the prequels are vastly more original in scope, tell a much larger story on a much grander scale and there are actually massive universe changing events and real stakes. You get none of that in the sequels. It feels like a tiny sideshow by comparison.

 

It's too bad the execution was horrible.  The PT could have been as good as the OT, but instead it was laughable how bad the dialogue and acting were.  I can't watch TPM or AOTC.  (ROTS isn't horrible, easily the best of the 3 even though I thought Anakin's turn was handled badly.)  The ST has its flaws, but it is a lot more enjoyable than the PT.

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24 minutes ago, Demodex said:

 

It's too bad the execution was horrible.  The PT could have been as good as the OT, but instead it was laughable how bad the dialogue and acting were.  I can't watch TPM or AOTC.  (ROTS isn't horrible, easily the best of the 3 even though I thought Anakin's turn was handled badly.)  The ST has its flaws, but it is a lot more enjoyable than the PT.

 

Yet many of us have the entire scripts to the prequels memorised, while only a few lines from the sequels stick out. Memorability is a key factor to enjoyment, and the ST falls way short of the PT.

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46 minutes ago, Demodex said:

 

It's too bad the execution was horrible.  The PT could have been as good as the OT, but instead it was laughable how bad the dialogue and acting were.  I can't watch TPM or AOTC.  (ROTS isn't horrible, easily the best of the 3 even though I thought Anakin's turn was handled badly.)  The ST has its flaws, but it is a lot more enjoyable than the PT.

 

The ST is objectively better films. The PT is objectively more ambitious story-telling. The ST is well executed money-making blockbusters. The PT is noble failures.

 

The ST has our willing dollars. The PT has our grudging respect.

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52 minutes ago, Þekþiþm said:

 

Yet many of us have the entire scripts to the prequels memorised, while only a few lines from the sequels stick out. Memorability is a key factor to enjoyment, and the ST falls way short of the PT.

 

That's the difference between trilogies made 15 years apart.  Plus the PT lines I remember are the ones that made me cringe or want to punch Lucas in the throat.

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5 minutes ago, Demodex said:

 

That's the difference between trilogies made 15 years apart.  Plus the PT lines I remember are the ones that made me cringe or want to punch Lucas in the throat.

 

Violence? This is what PT-hating has become?

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I'm more convinced than ever that there was no way a trilogy could tell the story they wanted to. If they were going to go for the different directors for each film approach like they did, they should've thrown the idea of a trilogy out the window and made a longer series. Abrams was just picking up the pieces of a work that no one could've saved. 

 

I remember thinking back when TFA came out that Abrams was a fool for not taking on the other two. I mean, who was optimistic that having these different voices come along to tell one cohesive story was going to be a smooth ride? 

 

Nothing against Johnson - after my second viewing months later of TLJ I came to love that film, but it feels like The Force Awakens Part 2, not the middle chapter of a trilogy. Ideally, there would be another film after TLJ.

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