Star Wars: The Last Jedi (SPOILERS)

[Pete_Fett]

Was that the Jedi sacred books in the drawer of the Falcon?  Rey took them before she left?

Yup.   

And Yoda knew it when he said something like "Has with her already what she needs"

[Darby]

Smart cookie, that Yoda.

One thing I was thinking about this morning - I don't have any major issue with the depiction of Luke's 'attempt' to kill Ben at the temple. I liked the Roshomon aspect of how it was presented, and how it re-contextualized Ben's fall. I don't like the staging though. It may be semantics, but Luke hovering over his bed as he slept doesn't feel very Luke Skywalker. I appreciate this movie challenging our views of him, but this just felt strange. Approaching Ben from behind as he was meditating, or training, perhaps would have been my personal choice. I also would have liked just a bit more of justification on Luke's part of what was so horrifying that he saw that he could not foresee any redemption for Ben. Luke had saved his father; he had accomplished this impossible thing. This emboldened him, obviously, and led to his hubris with Ben. Why not again? Just a little bit - an image, a suggestion, something.

[Nicklab]

WOW....

I went to see THE LAST JEDI yesterday after I got out of work.  And I'm still trying to process it all.  Luke's line "This is not going to go the way you think" pretty much summed up the entire movie for me.

I had expectations going into this movie.  And frankly, I was glad to see that it was not predictable.  There were certainly some recurring themes that got revisited, but this was an interesting take on things.  Rian Johnson took a bit of a deeper dive on the characters as well as The Force itself.  And just what does it mean to be a Jedi?

A lot of my own expectations seem to have been tied up in the cliffhanger ending of THE FORCE AWAKENS.  I thought that perhaps Rey was going to dive right into training with Luke, and that he would welcome her, and ask her where she got that lightsaber.  And he really did anything but that.  His dismissiveness where he tossed the lightsaber aside was a big indicator of where Luke's head was at right away.  I think a lot of what went wrong with Luke's new generation of Jedi is that he looked to THE PAST.  He sought out all of this knowledge of the Jedi Order.  But if the PT taught us anything, it's that the Jedi Order was a victim of its own pride and hubris.  It became more concerned about protecting the institution of the Order rather than listening to the Force.  Maybe Qui-Gon Jinn was right?  The Force Spirit of Yoda certainly seemed more prepared to let go of the past and move forward.  And I loved his line about the ancient texts not being a great read!

I also feel like the movie helped carry the concept of the First Order forward in a significant way.  In the OT the Empire was always presented as this monolithic military presence.  We didn't really get a sense of the society that would exist under such a government.  It took the entire PT to understand how the Empire came to be, and then we still didn't get a grasp on what life was like under the Empire.  But now?  The Canto Bight scenes really helped to establish what the First Order government means to society:  a well to do upper class that indulges in an opulent life, a put upon lower class of workers/servants and corrupt police were all wrapped up to give us a sense of it all.

And it was also good to see that there WERE some Imperial holdovers in the First Order.  Captain Cannady who commanded the First Order Dreadnought was a former Imperial.  And Captain Peavey, who was aboard the Snoke's ship the Supremacy was another former Imperial.  I only learned that because I picked up the Visual Dictionary...

Overall I saw this movie as being a great transitional point for a number of characters:  Luke, Rey, Finn, Poe, Leia and Kylo Ren all developed in unexpected ways.  And again, I think we're left with more questions than answers.  On the point of Rey's parents?  That seems like it's going to continue to be a mystery, even after she went through the mirror test in the cave.

[Scott]

BTW did Fox still have all of the rights to A New Hope Aliens?  I understand Abrams Edwards and Johnson all want to make their own new freaky designs but NOT including Rodians or Aquilish just seems weird...Canto Bight would have resonated a little more for me with some familiar "faces" in the crowd

I picked up the Art of TLJ yesterday and noted all of Canto Bight concept art scene paintings DO contain Rodians Twi'lek and Gran etc. So, they made an obvious choice or due to rights (again much like Abrams) decided to exclude any OT aliens...it's just sort of weird especially after Lucas did that in the PT all over the place

[Darby]

I don't see what rights Fox has (had) to any of the SW characters / iconography. They have distribution rights to the original SW film. That's all. Well, not all - they also had theatrical, nontheatrical, and home video rights worldwide for the five subsequent films before Disney took over. That was due to end in 2020 and would have, regardless of the Disney/Fox merger.

ANH they would have had the distribution rights on forever, but is now moot.

[Diddly]

Ok, after two screenings and two days to reflect, I still like the film. It's hard to rank though, as the Disney films still don't feel like "true Star Wars films" and thus I don't know if I could accurately rank them among Episodes 1-6.

Love the Holdo character and the entire bit with her sacrifice (but what was with the entire hangar being blown to hell but Finn and Rose are all fine?). Loved the ending shot with the kid using the Force to sweep. Loved the intro battle and how easily the slow bombers got blown to bits. I enjoyed the one liners even if some of them felt a bit forced.

My favorite part of the movie? Hux overlooking the damage to Snoke's throne room and pulling his pistol out, then putting it away when Kylo wakes up.

I still think the CGI was embarrassingly bad. I mentioned Yoda (though he looks better as that scene goes on) but the green screen backgrounds were painfully obvious as well. George Lucas would have never put out SFX that looked that shoddy. I thought Snoke was the only thing that felt complete.

Agreed that the casino needed some of the classic aliens. Not even any Twi'lek side pieces? I remember reading that Disney wanted new aliens to show how big the galaxy is, but whatever they put in the casino felt pretty uninspired. Canto Bight would have been a perfect opportunity for a Lando cameo too.

Christopher Reeve Superman Leia is weirder the more I think about it.

I think my biggest complaint outside of the CGI is that it felt more like a conclusion than a middle part of a story. After seeing TFA I had so many theories (and wanted to read everybody else's theories) about the characters and where they would go. Now? I don't really care. I'm fine with Rey's parents being nobodies, but that just opens up a huge can of worms regarding why the Skywalker lightsaber called to her, among other plot holes. The only true question I have now is "do Poe and Rey bang."

[Rob]

I finally saw it tonight.

Overall I THINK I really enjoyed it, but I need to think about it some more.  A lot of things didn't work for me, and since those things were more obvious to me, I'm going to start with those:

- First and foremost, Canto Blight.  Everything about that felt lifted from the prequels to me, never mind that the entire mission didn't advance the plot in any way whatsoever other than to put Finn on a path to fight with Phasma, who also is basically a big fancy throwaway, played by an actress that could have been ANYONE since you never saw her face. 

- BB-8 doing TOO DAMN MUCH... I draw the line at firing up an AT-ST out of left field.

- Luke having a temper tantrum and filling up his milk jug / catching a fish - super weird and unnecessary.

- Leia being blown out into space and not dying.  Finn giving himself up to wreck that cannon and not dying... Luke NOT giving himself up, but... dying?

- And I'm mixed about how they off'd Snoke.  On one hand, didn't see that coming until a few seconds before, so that's great, on the other hand - who the **** was he, we learned pretty much nothing about him whatsoever.

- Also, I get the darkest-before-dawn thing, and I get that the resistance is small... but the idea that those twenty or so people who have basically been failing all over the galaxy are 'the spark' and needed saving, when no one was coming to help them strikes me as silly. 

- Domhnall Gleeson, who I think is a phenomenal actor, is pretty awful in these.  He's too over-the-top, and just too young to be believable as the leader of this enormous army... maybe that's why they keep losing to little tiny band of rebels... 

- They made such a big deal out of the Knights of Ren in the first one, maybe they're saving them for the third, but I expected we'd learn something about them too.

- Lastly, I'm flat out pissed that Admiral Ackbar was kept around only to be blown out of a hole in the bridge so unceremoniously and then you only confirm that that had happened with one passing line of dialogue.

Overall I enjoyed most of it, thought it was action packed, LOVED seeing Luke again... but where does this thing go?  Rey v. Ben I suppose... but that one felt like the end of a trilogy, not the bridge.

[Rob]

George Lucas would have never put out SFX that looked that shoddy.

Did you miss the entire prequel trilogy?

[Darby]

BB-8 doing TOO DAMN MUCH... I draw the line at firing up an AT-ST out of left field.

Might be a little too much BB-8 - the machine gun coin bit in the jail was officially too much on the third viewing - but I had no problem with the AT-ST. He can repair, prime and I assume fly an X-Wing.

On one hand, didn't see that coming until a few seconds before, so that's great, on the other hand - who the **** was he, we learned pretty much nothing about him whatsoever.

They could have thrown us a bone on his backstory, knowing we'll never revisit it now. Clearly was present during the OT and PT, given his age. If he was a remote character out beyond the Uncharted Regions as some have speculated, he would have had no knowledge or interest in Vader. TLJ makes him out to be a Vader fanboy almost as much as Kylo.

- They made such a big deal out of the Knights of Ren in the first one, maybe they're saving them for the third, but I expected we'd learn something about them too.

I think we did - Luke tells Rey that Kylo burned the temple and 'vanished with a handful of students.' Didn't kill them. He took them. Why? For a minute I thought one of these kids was Rey, but apparently not. The vision of the Knights Rey sees in TFA in the rain was clearly not the past or the attack on the temple, but likely the future.

I think the end will be definitely Rey vs. Kylo, and Knights of Ren vs. Rey's New School Jedi.

[Phrubruh]

Yoda was a physical puppet in this one. He was a little strange looking though. A cg Yoda would have been better. Frank Oz did the voice but not the puppetry.

Super Leia in space was done before in Guardians of the Galaxy when Star Lord rescued Gamora. He lived. Leia has the Force and used it to save herself.

[Nicklab]

BTW did Fox still have all of the rights to A New Hope Aliens?  I understand Abrams Edwards and Johnson all want to make their own new freaky designs but NOT including Rodians or Aquilish just seems weird...Canto Bight would have resonated a little more for me with some familiar "faces" in the crowd

I picked up the Art of TLJ yesterday and noted all of Canto Bight concept art scene paintings DO contain Rodians Twi'lek and Gran etc. So, they made an obvious choice or due to rights (again much like Abrams) decided to exclude any OT aliens...it's just sort of weird especially after Lucas did that in the PT all over the place

There seems to have been a concious choice to include some different aliens in places like Jakku, Canto Bight and Takodana in the ST so far.  Part of me has written it off as this being a different part of the galaxy from the OT and PT.  And for the most part these might be aliens from systems that are associated with the First Order.

It's also worth noting that we DID see some familiar aliens turn up in ROGUE ONE.  There were Aqualish (Ponda Baba), at least one Twi'lek (Beezer Fortuna), Mon Calamari, etc.

I suspect that with the Resistance making their way to the Outer Rim for Episode IX, maybe we're going to see some more familiar alien species moving forward.  I think this may have been a story driven decision.

[Rob]

I think we did - Luke tells Rey that Kylo burned the temple and 'vanished with a handful of students.' Didn't kill them. He took them. Why? For a minute I thought one of these kids was Rey, but apparently not. The vision of the Knights Rey sees in TFA in the rain was clearly not the past or the attack on the temple, but likely the future.

I think the end will be definitely Rey vs. Kylo, and Knights of Ren vs. Rey's New School Jedi.

Yeah, but it's thin.  All we learned about them was what we'd pretty much figured out before.  No idea where they are, if they survived, if Kylo Ren has disciples of his own right now? 

Ultimately to me this movie felt more like Episode 7 Part 2... it picks up exactly where the old one left off and takes place over the course of basically one day.

I suppose it's an important day, and big stuff happens on it, but to me this entire conflict feels to localized.  If Episode 9 is going to revolve around Ren's knights and Rey's Jedi, then they're going to have to let some time actually pass between those two episodes... which I'd prefer.

[Darby]

These are definitely two parts of the same movie, which is a very TV episode structure that JJ imposed on it with the cliffhanger end to TFA. It's different, but it's limiting, compared to previous films.

We definitely need to have some time pass between 8 and 9. Especially in light of Carrie Fisher; I think the only thing they can do is have Leia pass between the films. She died perhaps of her injuries in this movie, or something else. And then we see her and Luke together at the end of the film as Force ghosts. Otherwise a CGI Leia or recast Leia would be too much of a distraction.

The story is broken. Leia won't be picking up where Luke left off and become perhaps the matriarch of a new Jedi circle. She won't be achieving any closure with her son. There's nothing to be done about it. It sucks.

[Pete_Fett]

- And I'm mixed about how they off'd Snoke.  On one hand, didn't see that coming until a few seconds before, so that's great, on the other hand - who the **** was he, we learned pretty much nothing about him whatsoever.

Personally, I don't think we're done with Snoke just because he's dead.

There is a theory floating around that Snoke is The First Jedi - the mosaic on the floor where the drops of water had formed a pool and Luke tells Rey about the hubris of the Jedi Order, is a depiction of "the Prime Jedi, the first of the Order, in a state of meditation and balance" - that's from the Visual Guide of The Last Jedi. The prime jedi looks a lot like Snoke.

In The Force Awakens, Han Solo says about Luke - "People who knew him best think he went looking for the first Jedi Temple"

And then finally in the visual guide of the The Force Awakens, in a description of Snoke it says "Snoke disguises his true nature"

If the Jedi Temple on Ahch-to is indeed the first Jedi Temple, and the mosaic is a depiction of Snoke, the first Jedi, one who could balance both the Light and the Dark, there is definitely more that we'll learn about Snoke in the future.

Heck, what if Rian Johnson's new trilogy is about the start of the Jedi Order itself and we'll get confirmation of all of this in that saga?

[Jedi Idej]

Yoda was a physical puppet in this one.

Interesting. I wasn't sure if it was a physical puppet or CG made to look like a puppet. Not a biggie, and I'm all for homage, but I prefer those be more subtle or reminiscent. (Loved the Hardware Wars reference.)

Super Leia in space was done before in Guardians of the Galaxy when Star Lord rescued Gamora. He lived. Leia has the Force and used it to save herself.

I thought about that, too, when Leia's fingers moved. I think a labored drift back would have been more effective. Even in a fantasy with force speed and force jump, the Mary Poppins flight was too much of a WTF.