Looks kind of dumb, so it's very Star Wars alright. (Off-Topic)

by Kermit , Raleigh, NC, Monday, May 06, 2019, 17:22 (2026 days ago) @ MacAddictXIV

Regarding the backlash and capturing what Star Wars is, honestly I put TLJ up pretty high in capturing the essence of Star Wars. This essence not being limited to the modern canon. The biggest complaints (and we’ll sidestep the sexism - though a lot of the more vocal and vitriolic complaints were from that angle) stemmed around 30 years of one expectation of Luke as a character. TLJ allowed him to remain flawed and multidimensional, but it harmed an idol shaped like Luke Skywalker for a lot of people. But a lot of those complaints about the handling of Luke missed the point of OT Luke’s arc. So, what can you do.

Yeah... that's a great way to put it. Everyone was ready for Luke to be the wise master and teach Rey the ways of the Force... and that would have been awesome, but I think we got something much more interesting instead. We got a Luke Skywalker who failed, who cut himself off from the Force, but who ultimately found his way back... all without having to murder younglings! To me, everything that happened between Luke, Kylo, Rey, and Yoda is the best of Star Wars. No, it's not flashy space battles or duels with laser swords. It's better. It's story and plot and emotion.

The best part of Star Wars has always been story, plot, and emotion. Leaving the bullshit virture signaling aside, TLJ doesn't work for me because Luke's fall is premised on actions that went against the core of who he was in the original trilogy. Call it a character retcon.

Or call it he grew up or he got smarter? I don't think you can treat him as the same person as the original trilogy because he isn't the same person.

So his instincts to appeal to the good in Darth freaking Vader was such a success that he got smarter or grew into someone who threw those instincts out the window and decided to murder Darth's grandson in his sleep.

Umkay.

I mean, I feel like there is a big difference from already evil Darth Vader and appealing to his good side to a kid you are training and watching him get more and more evil and having to do something about it.

They both deal with good and evil, but they aren't the same thing.

So you’re saying kill the kid, but hope that old man will change. If anything his response should have been the reverse. I’m not saying that something like Luke’s arc could not have happened, but such a story needs to be told carefully and well. That’s not The Last Jedi. It’s a sloppy movie more concerned with fucking with expectations from one minute to the next because of some juvenile idea that the hero’s journey is somehow antiquated and needs to be subverted.