Star Wars Episode VIII - The Last Jedi *spoilers from Post 2857*

Slydice

Had another look at the numbers and it looks like:

Top Chart (Money)

• The Last Jedi had an opening weekend kinda boost that looked like it built on The Force Awakens
• Probably after word of mouth spread, The Last Jedi fell has fallen in line with Rogue One

Bottom Chart (Percentages)

• There looks be a trend to cinema attendance as similar spikes happen (TFA 2015 - XMas on Fri, RO 2016 - XMas on Sun, TLJ 2017 - XMas on Mon)
• The Last Jedi percentages (bottom chart) happen one day after Rogue One and look to be settling just below Rogue One.

So yeah, I think my revised estimate is still likely

Slydice wrote: »

I'd say revise down to somewhere between 1.25 and 1.5bn.

Money:


Percentage the money changed each day:


data source:
http://www.boxofficemojo.com/ - Showdowns - Rogue v. Force Awakens v Last Jedi
http://www.boxofficemojo.com/showdowns/chart/?id=roguevforce.htm

Wibbs

Mrs Shuttleworth wrote: »

Late to the party.

First film I ever saw was A New Hope in 1977 in Savoy One aged four, went a further 13 times.

Loved Rogue One and think Revenge of the Sith is the best of the entire saga (sorry).

What will I think of "Jedi""?

It's enjoyable enough and looks very good but I'd not question too much of the plot too deeply and it's a bit long, but I'd say it's worth a watch.

Means Of Escape

Utter rubbish from beginning to end
In fact it is worse than TFA which itself was a hodgepodge rehash of the original triology
These movies had nothing new ,story stuck in a rut the characters are forgettable and even Skywalker was disappointing and now he's popped his clogs

The script writers are making it up as they go along
SWRO was a far superior movie than the other two combined
TLJ was overlong with overacting characters all thrown together not knowing what part they have to play .

An assault on the eyes

Jayesdiem

Deleted User wrote: »

I absolutely can't stand the gender bull**** being shoehorned into the criticism of this film

Get used to it my friend. I have no doubt our generation will live to see the first gender-fluid protagonist in Star Wars.

silverharp

i wonder where this is

silverharp

silverharp wrote: »

i wonder where this is

Saw so many articles have a go at American audiences over that but honestly I have seen many a screw up in a film in which there was no sound and it was hard to tell if it was intentional or not. When I saw the Town the sound went just before the end and my first thought was what a nice stylistic touch by Affleck it was, turned out the some of the speakers had blown and as such the dialogue was no longer there.

Drumpot

Mrs Shuttleworth wrote: »

Late to the party.

First film I ever saw was A New Hope in 1977 in Savoy One aged four, went a further 13 times.

Loved Rogue One and think Revenge of the Sith is the best of the entire saga (sorry).

What will I think of "Jedi""?

If you are particularly sensitive about them expanding or changing (force) elements of the universe or characters you might get a surprise. Some people are struggling to accept alterations and as such feel every other little thing in the movie warrants critical analysis that they don’t appear to apply to the originals.

Also, if you hate that Disney is making it , you are prob already negatively bias against it so will inevitably find things that annoy you more then they probably should.

My recommendation is don’t read these forums. People could ruin it for you by infecting you with their negative over thinking pretentious waffle! It’s Star Wars , try to go and just enjoy the experience and focus on taking what you liked instead of letting what yoU didn’t like ruin the whole movie.

Sad Professor

Deleted User wrote: »

Saw so many articles have a go at American audiences over that but honestly I have seen many a screw up in a film in which there was no sound and it was hard to tell if it was intentional or not. When I saw the Town the sound went just before the end and my first thought was what a nice stylistic touch by Affleck it was, turned out the some of the speakers had blown and as such the dialogue was no longer there.

Yeah, it's a tribute to just how bad the theatrical experience is these days that they have put up a sign like that. Also shows how little creativity of this sort there is mainstream cinema that it needs to be explained to people in advance in case they think it's a technical error and make a complaint.

@ silverharp, it's the scene in which Holdo lightspeeds through Snoke's ship. But there are a couple of other silent moments in the film, like in the beginning with Rose's sister.

Varik

Sad Professor wrote: »

Yeah, it's a tribute to just how bad the theatrical experience is these days that they have put up a sign like that. Also shows how little creativity of this sort there is mainstream cinema that it needs to be explained to people in advance in case they think it's a technical error and make a complaint.

@ silverharp, it's the scene in which Holdo lightspeeds through Snoke's ship. But there are a couple of other silent moments in the film, like in the beginning with Rose's sister.

Don't think it's that bad.

Casino royale
Passion of the Chirst
Wizard of Oz

All of these had something similar, that had people concerned that something had gone wrong.

radonicus

Deleted User wrote: »

A good writer could do that without using such a cheap and plain dumb idea. All he learnt from his failures is to be a good lil boy and do as he is told. It makes no sense for them to tell everyone but him the plan, it's just one example of poor writing from a script full of awful writing in which characters do dumb illogical things to serve the plot.

I think that's the key thing. The film tries to do some interesting things with characters but the execution of them is appalling, and leaves you confused. The only one that worked was Ren's.


I watched it back again and there's an interesting bit right at the end, with the young kid and the broom..

Saruhashi

I'm sure this take on TLJ will be well received here.

conorhal

Saruhashi wrote: »

I'm sure this take on TLJ will be well received here.

I just goddamn love Razorfist, he's like a dictoinary of the profane exploding in your face

Nostalgia Critic's review was also worth waiting for.

david75

Tony EH wrote: »

This is ridiculous David.

Try again.

I think you have rose tinted glasses about the OT welded to your skull and a over critical cynicism hardwired to your view of the new films. They can and should be judged separately but the same set of rules should apply when it comes to characters and yet they don’t seem to for you. If Rey was male or even if ANH was released today, we wouldn’t be having this conversation about Luke’s sudden abilities at all.

Vladimir Poontang

david75 wrote: »

I think you have rose tinted glasses about the OT welded to your skull and a over critical cynicism hardwired to your view of the new films. They can and should be judged separately but the same set of rules should apply when it comes to characters and yet they don’t seem to for you. If Rey was male or even if ANH was released today, we wouldn’t be having this conversation about Luke’s sudden abilities at all.

What abilities were those? Breathing? Walking? Talking?

conorhal

david75 wrote: »

I think you have rose tinted glasses about the OT welded to your skull and a over critical cynicism hardwired to your view of the new films. They can and should be judged separately but the same set of rules should apply when it comes to characters and yet they don’t seem to for you. If Rey was male or even if ANH was released today, we wouldn’t be having this conversation about Luke’s sudden abilities at all.

Uh.. yeah, I really think we would...

david75

Tony you’ll love this

Wibbs

david75 wrote: »

I think you have rose tinted glasses about the OT welded to your skull

I certainly don't. Star Wars was good, a bit hokey, but wonderfully mixed all sorts of sources into a new universe that gave rise to a huge cultural icon. Empire improved on it and barely put a foot wrong, save for the treatment of Leia which was a backward step and no mistake. Return was a bit of a mess. Tied things up, but had all sorts of holes. And bloody Ewoks.

The Prequels are all over the place in tone. Which is a pity as there was an actual story trying to get out, Revenge being the only one that stood out. Taking a scissors to all three and cutting it down to one flic would make a big difference.

and a over critical cynicism hardwired to your view of the new films.

The Force Awakens was pretty good and a well made film(with a few reservations on character), as a standalone, albeit a near plot point for plot point copy of the original. A mix of cynical marketing and playing it safe. But it largely served the purpose of rejigging the franchise in the face of the prequels and pointing a new path with new peeps. The Last Jedi dropped the ball on the latter, cause post modernist irony or somesuch guff and the characterisations were all over the place. Never mind that there was little to no progress in their narratives and little to no progress in the overall narrative. Mid way through a trilogy.

They can and should be judged separately but the same set of rules should apply when it comes to characters and yet they don’t seem to for you.

Eh.. that's precisely what you are doing here.

If Rey was male or even if ANH was released today, we wouldn’t be having this conversation about Luke’s sudden abilities at all.

I hate to burst your bubble D but if Rey were male I'd be saying the exact same thing. Hell, I've said Poe is a one trick pony, Finn a wasted potential, Kylo has basically two modes; brooding and toddler tantrum and it turns out Snoke is a nobody. So no the daft "uhhh sexism" explanation doesn't wash.

And I dunno how many times this needs to be pointed out(and I have done so in detail) Luke has pretty much no sudden abilities. The only two occasions he does the force thing is half heartedly with shoots him in the bum laser HoverBot3000 and when Ben tells him to use the Force. And the latter is at the very end of the film(even then he had already reckoned he could hit it, just like him and his mates hit similar sized targets back home). That's it. End of. The rest of the story he needs a lot of saving by others. In the next flic he does the force pull and it takes him ages(after he gets captured by a yeti). Then crawls away half dead only for Han to save him. He's a decidedly poor student with Yoda and Yoda spells this out and hopes his sister is better. His first sword fight with his da understandably ends up with him getting his arse kicked and again he needs saving. No sudden abilities there. Across two films. He improves by the third but time has passed and even then he needs help.

Rey is instantly brilliant at every single thing she does and this point is hammered home repeatedly. All within hours of hearing the force is real and within a few minutes of screen time. Rather than Mary Sue, which seems to hackle up people(or makes for a good excuse to deflect from the obvious issues) I'd see her as more a Disney Princess and I think that more accurate and not a shock considering who now owns the franchise. And like a Disney Princess Rey is awesome out of the box and her only "struggle" is finding out how truly awesome she is. All she is short of is a pair of glass slippers. That's the joke and irony to all this of course. It relegates a woman character to a very old style superpower princess with no struggle, no growth, she just has to wait for her natural awesomeness to come out. All it's missing is a Prince Charming.

I really dunno what two characters you reckon are the same, but they are not Luke and Rey. Or anybody else in any of the SW films.

Tony EH

david75 wrote: »

I think you have rose tinted glasses about the OT welded to your skull and a over critical cynicism hardwired to your view of the new films. They can and should be judged separately

Feel free to discuss the problems with the original trilogy, becasue there's quite a few and I've talked about them before, the biggest of which begins with an E, ends with a K and has a W and an O in the middle.

Also, these films ARE being judged separately and the judgements on the poor writing, characterisation, plotting and execution are available to see without any mention of the OT at all. In fact, it's the defenders of these new Disney Star Wars films that are usually the first to bring up the whataboutary regarding the OT, when any criticism is leveled at the sequels.

david75 wrote: »

If Rey was male or even if ANH was released today, we wouldn’t be having this conversation about Luke’s sudden abilities at all.

No. Super Rey would get just a much criticism if she was called Ray. She's a poorly written character, regardless of sex. But, she's not alone amongst the poorly written characters in these films. Finn and Poe stand along side her.

It's badly written characters that's at the heart of the criticism. Not their gender.

expectationlost

david75 wrote: »

She’s been working as a scavenger for almost her entire life and trading at a space port with multiple species passing through. Stands to reason she Can do all these things. She also tells us she’s a pilot Early in the film.
She would have and has clearly had to learn how to defend herself hence th staff constantly be her side.
None of that is good enough though.
The Mary Sue thing is as obnoxious and flawed an accusation as they come.
Luke hears about the force on Wednesday and on Friday has mastery of it enough to blow up a Death Star. With no explanation or reasoning given yet we never challenge it. Anakin aged 9 can fly pod racers and is the only human able to do it yet nobody questions it. .

nobody never ever?

expectationlost

Tony EH wrote: »

But, that's just stupid.

Everyone gets the memo on the escape to Krait plan, but not Poe, because he's a hothead?

Besides...

Dameron admonishes Holdo becasue simply ejecting into space is certain death and he's correct. If Holdo had said, actually Part 2 of that is getting down to that planet and holding up in a heavily armed bunker, like she apparently told everyone else on the ship, it would have at least expanded his knowledge to a more agreeable position as under the circumstances that plan made sense.

The mutiny is staged because Holdo kept essential info back from Poe, unnecessarily.

...and, frankly it's just a badly written attempt at injecting some drama into the proceedings.

I havn't watched the last jedi more then once but if poe is responsible for leaking the cloaked transports plan wasn't admiral holdo right in not telling him what she was planning earlier

expectationlost

isn't it funny that they have such advanced ships but not remote piloting tech

I think that if you need to defend the writing by saying "people who dislike it are misogynists" or "you would have no problem if it was a man you misogynist" then you really don't have much of a defense. If you can't engage in discussion without attacking people who have a different point of view then why bother. I enjoyed the film for what it was, brainless blockbuster fare that I had all but forgotten as soon as I left the cinema.

There are a number of issues I have with the film, the characterization and the poor writing are two big ones. I think Rey is a weak character, not because I hate women but because so far the scripts have failed her. Same as they have failed the rest of the new cast who have become cliched copies of characters from the original films. If I think Finn is an awfully written character who adds nothing to the film does that mean that I hate men?

Venom

Deleted User wrote: »

A good writer could do that without using such a cheap and plain dumb idea. All he learnt from his failures is to be a good lil boy and do as he is told. It makes no sense for them to tell everyone but him the plan, it's just one example of poor writing from a script full of awful writing in which characters do dumb illogical things to serve the plot.

The entire reason he's demoted is just awful writing and makes zero sense considering the nature and history of the resistance. He lost a few pilots saving the entire fleet from destruction by taking out the one New Order ship that would have murdered them all from range.

Yet, losing tons of people to save the galaxy/friends/everyone else is the go to tactic for the Rebels/resistance!

Rogue One - huge amount of Rebels died getting the Death Star plans. Mission a success.
Star Wars - all but three ships survive the Death Star assault.Mission a success.
Empire - god only knows how many troops and speeder pilots died during the Hoth escape.Mission a success.
Jedi - massive amounts of Rebel troops,fighters, bombers and capital ships go boom in the second Death Star assault.Mission a success.
TFA - majority of Rebel fighters shot down in attack on Starkiller base.Mission a success.
TLJ - losing a few bombers taking down an immediate treat to fleet. Mission a failure and demotion for leader!

Fcuk the writers of this mess.

johnny_ultimate

I actually thought The Last Jedi went at least some distance to portray Rey as a more flawed, less inexplicably powerful character. The film spends far less time on her semi-miraculously overcoming obstacles than TFA did. To wit:

She is shown as struggling to contain her abilities - as Luke points out, she started drifting towards the darkness incredibly easily during her 'meditation', and - as he explicitly states - her raw power terrifies him. This manifests itself again during the storm just before she leaves the island, when she 'gives in' to Kylo and seems to overpower Luke by channelling raw emotion, in this case fury. Much of the film is, after all, concerned with how there's a little bit of darkness in Rey, and a little bit of light (later apparently extinguished) in Kylo.

Her impulsive, foolhardy effort to confront Kylo and Snoke is, well, foolhardy: she gets immediately & definitively overwhelmed by Snoke and is only rescued by Kylo taking advantage of his master's cruelty & arrogance. She also appears to reveal Luke's location to Snoke, shortly before he's chopped in half

Her big, showstopping force moment at the end of the film is a direct callback to the lesson we did see her learn from Luke earlier on - a jump from rocks to boulders, but nonetheless a follow-up on something we've directly seen her channeling before on a smaller scale during a lesson about the force (as an aside: I love that little montage of nature Johnson puts in there. It's a familiar technique, but a nice little touch here to visualise and emphasise what Luke is explaining).

Her melee combat skills were established in the last film well before she picked up a lightsaber, and based on the early scene showing her fightin' stick skills, it's one lightly explained background detail I personally have happily accepted as one an orphan is likely to have picked up after a decade or two on a hostile planet (no different from Luke and his womp rat hitting skills - a pivotal character trait established in, as far as I recall, a single line of dialogue). No major miracles here beyond what we've seen her do already, either - indeed, both Kylo and Rey rely on each other to get themselves out of hairy moments during their brawl against the guards, and we do get a scene of her practicing her 'saber skills (which ends with her again not quite being aware of her own power).

I have no doubt a few shortcuts have been taken when it comes to Rey's characterisation (even allowing for a generous reading that her - and Kylo's - extraordinarily powerful force skills are part of her character & the trilogy's overarching story). There's still work to be done in pushing her character further, and I think some of the other characters enjoy richer, more interesting and deeper arcs here (Luke and Kylo primarily, even if Rey's journey is interwoven with theirs). The telepathy, while essential, is rather 'this is just happening because it needs to, OK?' But when it comes to 'she can just use the force, innit?', TFA was a far worse offender: even given the amount of things going on here vying for screentime, Johnson does introduce failure and flaws into Rey's character direction in a way Abrams did not (outside of her getting captured by Kylo).

As I've said before, one of my favourite things about TLJ is its awareness of and explicit efforts to confront many of the weaknesses and indeed just general approach of TFA. It's treatment of Rey is part of that, although the strongest aspect is Johnson's brutal, thematically appropriate treatment / dismissal of her familial 'mystery box'.

conorhal

Wibbs wrote: »

I certainly don't. Star Wars was good, a bit hokey, but wonderfully mixed all sorts of sources into a new universe that gave rise to a huge cultural icon. Empire improved on it and barely put a foot wrong, save for the treatment of Leia which was a backward step and no mistake. Return was a bit of a mess. Tied things up, but had all sorts of holes. And bloody Ewoks.

The Prequels are all over the place in tone. Which is a pity as there was an actual story trying to get out, Revenge being the only one that stood out. Taking a scissors to all three and cutting it down to one flic would make a big difference.

The Force Awakens was pretty good and a well made film(with a few reservations on character), as a standalone, albeit a near plot point for plot point copy of the original. A mix of cynical marketing and playing it safe. But it largely served the purpose of rejigging the franchise in the face of the prequels and pointing a new path with new peeps. The Last Jedi dropped the ball on the latter, cause post modernist irony or somesuch guff and the characterisations were all over the place. Never mind that there was little to no progress in their narratives and little to no progress in the overall narrative. Mid way through a trilogy.

Eh.. that's precisely what you are doing here. I hate to burst your bubble D but if Rey were male I'd be saying the exact same thing. Hell, I've said Poe is a one trick pony, Finn a wasted potential, Kylo has basically two modes; brooding and toddler tantrum and it turns out Snoke is a nobody. So no the daft "uhhh sexism" explanation doesn't wash.

And I dunno how many times this needs to be pointed out(and I have done so in detail) Luke has pretty much no sudden abilities. The only two occasions he does the force thing is half heartedly with shoots him in the bum laser HoverBot3000 and when Ben tells him to use the Force. And the latter is at the very end of the film(even then he had already reckoned he could hit it, just like him and his mates hit similar sized targets back home). That's it. End of. The rest of the story he needs a lot of saving by others. In the next flic he does the force pull and it takes him ages(after he gets captured by a yeti). Then crawls away half dead only for Han to save him. He's a decidedly poor student with Yoda and Yoda spells this out and hopes his sister is better. His first sword fight with his da understandably ends up with him getting his arse kicked and again he needs saving. No sudden abilities there. Across two films. He improves by the third but time has passed and even then he needs help.

Rey is instantly brilliant at every single thing she does and this point is hammered home repeatedly. All within hours of hearing the force is real and within a few minutes of screen time. Rather than Mary Sue, which seems to hackle up people(or makes for a good excuse to deflect from the obvious issues) I'd see her as more a Disney Princess and I think that more accurate and not a shock considering who now owns the franchise. And like a Disney Princess Rey is awesome out of the box and her only "struggle" is finding out how truly awesome she is. All she is short of is a pair of glass slippers. That's the joke and irony to all this of course. It relegates a woman character to a very old style superpower princess with no struggle, no growth, she just has to wait for her natural awesomeness to come out. All it's missing is a Prince Charming.

I really dunno what two characters you reckon are the same, but they are not Luke and Rey. Or anybody else in any of the SW films.

Not only does Luke get his ass handed to him as often as he wins, his youthful arrogance and impetuousness lands him in a load of hot water.
These are all character developing moments for Luke and you get to see them happen.
One of the things that has really annoyed me about the new trilogy has been the fact that there is practically zero character development and almost all the characters motivations and story are delivered to you through flashbacks, which is some seriously bad, extremely lazy, screenwriting. Then in the middle of the new trilogy you get what is effectively a soft reboot of the franchise.
I'm genuinely baffled that anybody can look at the mess that TLJ is and call it anything other then a shoddy, inept script that poorly services the characters and story arc that it utterly fails to progress.

Johnmb

Tony EH wrote: »

It's badly written characters that's at the heart of the criticism.

That's my problem with the film. I genuinely didn't care what happened to any of the characters. Even Leia and Luke. They had the same names, and were played by the same actors, as characters in the OT, but they weren't the same characters, and I couldn't bring myself to care about them any more than I could bring myself to care for any of the other characters. They were so poorly written.
It was incredibly poor story telling: "Some stuff happened. And then, in the middle of that stuff, some other stuff happened too. You don't need to get to know the characters, watch, some stuff is happening, isn't that cool!". That's not good storytelling.
There were many plot holes in the OT, not many people cared because they were more interested in the characters that the stuff was happening to, rather than just the stuff itself.
As for all the Rey = Mary Sue comments, I don't actually have much of a problem with that. She picked up her mechanic skills over years of cobbling together things from scrap, and could apply that to the Falcon because it is a heap of junk, it always has been, that's been a running theme since it was first introduced! She can fight because she had to protect herself while growing up, and she is shown practicing. She beat an injured Kylo Ren, who was also emotionally distracted (as Snoke confirmed). As for her Force powers, not having training doesn't mean she can't have the power, just lack the control. And that was shown as a problem when she confronted Snoke. Kylo, while he has had training, has been shown to lack control also. The lack of control is likely what makes them so powerful. Having said that, if the explanation of her parentage as given in TLJ is the end of the matter, then that will be terrible story telling again. They have to give some explanation as to how she has so much power as to scare Luke. Kylo was the grandson of the "chosen one", Rey needs something equally important to explain her power (and hopefully not a virgin birth ala Anakin explanation!).

pumpkin4life

Skip to 23:07 and watch for the next two or so minutes. 23:40 be the worst of it.

Tony EH

johnny_ultimate wrote: »

I actually thought The Last Jedi went at least some distance to portray Rey as a more flawed, less inexplicably powerful character. The film spends far less time on her semi-miraculously overcoming obstacles than TFA did. To wit:

She is shown as struggling to contain her abilities - as Luke points out, she started drifting towards the darkness incredibly easily during her 'meditation', and - as he explicitly states - her raw power terrifies him. This manifests itself again during the storm just before she leaves the island, when she 'gives in' to Kylo and seems to overpower Luke by channelling raw emotion, in this case fury. Much of the film is, after all, concerned with how there's a little bit of darkness in Rey, and a little bit of light (later apparently extinguished) in Kylo.

Her impulsive, foolhardy effort to confront Kylo and Snoke is, well, foolhardy: she gets immediately & definitively overwhelmed by Snoke and is only rescued by Kylo taking advantage of his master's cruelty & arrogance. She also appears to reveal Luke's location to Snoke, shortly before he's chopped in half

Her big, showstopping force moment at the end of the film is a direct callback to the lesson we did see her learn from Luke earlier on - a jump from rocks to boulders, but nonetheless a follow-up on something we've directly seen her channeling before on a smaller scale during a lesson about the force (as an aside: I love that little montage of nature Johnson puts in there. It's a familiar technique, but a nice little touch here to visualise and emphasise what Luke is explaining).

Her melee combat skills were established in the last film well before she picked up a lightsaber, and based on the early scene showing her fightin' stick skills, it's one lightly explained background detail I personally have happily accepted as one an orphan is likely to have picked up after a decade or two on a hostile planet (no different from Luke and his womp rat hitting skills - a pivotal character trait established in, as far as I recall, a single line of dialogue). No major miracles here beyond what we've seen her do already, either - indeed, both Kylo and Rey rely on each other to get themselves out of hairy moments during their brawl against the guards, and we do get a scene of her practicing her 'saber skills (which ends with her again not quite being aware of her own power).

I have no doubt a few shortcuts have been taken when it comes to Rey's characterisation (even allowing for a generous reading that her - and Kylo's - extraordinarily powerful force skills are part of her character & the trilogy's overarching story). There's still work to be done in pushing her character further, and I think some of the other characters enjoy richer, more interesting and deeper arcs here (Luke and Kylo primarily, even if Rey's journey is interwoven with theirs). The telepathy, while essential, is rather 'this is just happening because it needs to, OK?' But when it comes to 'she can just use the force, innit?', TFA was a far worse offender: even given the amount of things going on here vying for screentime, Johnson does introduce failure and flaws into Rey's character direction in a way Abrams did not (outside of her getting captured by Kylo).

As I've said before, one of my favourite things about TLJ is its awareness of and explicit efforts to confront many of the weaknesses and indeed just general approach of TFA. It's treatment of Rey is part of that, although the strongest aspect is Johnson's brutal, thematically appropriate treatment / dismissal of her familial 'mystery box'.

It tried, but I was expecting better. The problem is Rey is already damaged goods, by the time the crawl for 'The Last Jedi' starts. The worst sins of her "character" are built in by the lack of good writing for 'The Force Awakens'.

Sure, it's good to see Snoke actually being some kind of threat - speaking of bad writing, for him it's non-existant - but it's not enough to round off or flesh out somebody that the audience is suppose to give a damn about.

Maybe in IX, we might get a hint of just why Rey is what she is. But with Abrams back at the helm, I won't be holding my breath.

There's too much "just because..." going on here.

Wibbs

conorhal wrote: »

Not only does Luke get his ass handed to him as often as he wins, his youthful arrogance and impetuousness lands him in a load of hot water.
These are all character developing moments for Luke and you get to see them happen.

Which we don't see happening with Rey. Any such struggles are pretty much not there except in the minds of the audience searching for whys.

The main difference for me is nada to do with either Rey or Ren, who are both drawn thinner than a pauper's soup, it's how the Force, that other main character, has been changed under Disney. Where before it was an ability, a talent, now it's a superpower.

There's a subtle and obvious difference between those two. A talent may be latent, but it will remain latent without knowledge of it and training in it. If a pair of identical twins have a latent athletics talent, but only one twin is interested by it and trains hard, he or she will handily beat the other twin in a race.

A superpower just is. Once a character finds out they have it they can just use it(which is what Rey does). The only struggle is in the responsibility attached to such a superpower. We see this all the time in superhero flics, though it's explored much further in TV land. QV Netflix' Luke Cage, Daredevil, Jessica Jones where it makes for an interesting story when "real people" have these powers almost forced upon them.

So for me Rey and to a lesser degree Ren are now superheros with a superpower. Snoke most certainly is. It means that the writers can be lazy and not show nearly as much in character development or backstory in a way that would be required if the force is a latent talent. And one reason why superhero flics work as blockbusters, because the audience can be "lazy" too. And of course because a superpower just basically happens it's more appealing to many. It's like the difference between winning the Euromillions or building a multimillion euro company from scratch. How many do the latter compared to how many do the former?

Hence Snoke's backstory really doesn't matter in this shift, neither does Rey's(or note, her parentage), or Ren's(he goes dark side, not because he wants to speed up his training, or be more powerful or is seduced, but because it just grows in him.). Even Leia doing a superman literally illustrates this shift. She had the same latent talent as her bro, but there is no indication she had training. The only time she shows hints of it is in brief telepathic moments with Luke in the OT. Yet because it's now a superpower she can survive the vacuum of space and fly back to safety. In this context change that daft scene makes perfect sense. I mean if it was another blockbuster with superheroes nobody would have batted an eye at it. Most did, because I suspect we knew instinctively that the force in the original didn't work like that.

So yeah I think if we view this pretty major shift in how this Force is represented then we don't need to think of Mary Sue's or parentage or training or explanation or much backstory. And that's what we get in this trilogy.

I'm genuinely baffled that anybody can look at the mess that TLJ is and call it anything other then a shoddy, inept script that poorly services the characters and story arc that it utterly fails to progress.

I think there are a few reasons. 1) people, fans need these flics to work and expect them to work, so give the shoddiness far more leeway than they otherwise would. 2) It has the usual colour by numbers explosions on the regular(more than any other SW flic I can think of), so that keeps some of the blockbuster audience engaged and young kids of course. 3) Fans of this director tend to be quite blind to his failings and by god they're on the screen for all to see on this outing. To the degree that his previous flics look like someone else directed them. 4) a section of fans love an oul retcon for all sorts of reasons and they got that here(they love the burn the past stuff, thinking it innovative and the like, even when it makes NO sense). 5) there is also the background cultural polarisation going on too. So opinions tend to be much more black and white and differences of opinion lead to more polarisation. Rey as Mary Sue an obvious one. At one extreme, particularly in the US, we have go girl "feminists" who thinks she's brilliant because XX chromosomes and see any criticism as "sexist", at the other we have true blue cast iron chauvinists that are pissed off Rey isn't Ray and men are mostly wasters in the film. Joke is both have a point.

DrWu

I'm out.

Levels of whingeing, sexism and silly nit-picking have reached neurotic levels. Bad for the soul.

Ciao bro's