Star Wars: The Last Jedi Discussion Thread [SPOILERS ALLOWED!]

[Metalhead]

9 minutes ago, DogofWar1 said:

Two quick questions, and I was looking in the movie but might've missed it, but who/what was the string the First Order used to track them through hyperspace, and two, was BDT actually the haker they sought or just a random hacker guy?  I kept looking for little narrative queues on both and kept not seeing them but it certainly is possible I missed a line here or there that explained it.

The movie never stated what was at the end of the string, it only can be assumed to be the tracker. However, it was heavily implied that Holdo was a traitor and setting the Resistance up for certain death, through her weak actions, decisions, and Poe's mutiny.

[drowland]

3 hours ago, justice98 said:

This was the first time in 40 years of these movies that I can remember that anybody ever mentioned fuel. Who knew the plot of the movie was gonna revolve around running out of gas.

 

With the Jedi books Luke had on the island, I read that this is also the first Star Wars movie that had paper in it. 

[thebluefood]

Finally saw it over the weekend. My three word review: 

 

[Reverb SFX]

 

KAMIKAZES IN SPAAAAAAAAAACE 

[Llevron]

15 hours ago, Momma There Goes That Man said:

I thought Lando was going to be the code breaker in the casino planet 

 

Thanks now I'm sad he wasn't 

[Bishop Hammer]

14 hours ago, Gallen5862 said:

 

JJ Abrams could have Luke come back as a Force Ghost! He could tell Rey that she is actually the twin sister to Ben/Kylo. That her parents are Han Solo and Leia. That Snoke detected Ben being born and that they wanted to protect Rey until she was needed.That was the reason that Vader"s and Luke"s  lightsaber reacted to Rey. That the drunk parent story that Kylo told her about were really a cover story!  Luke could tell Rey who Snoke really was and what training that kylo had received from Luke and probably from Snoke. Luke could tell Rey that is why she had the connection to Ren, He could tell Rey how ben was turned into Kylo and how to turn him back into Ben.

 

[Momma There Goes That Man]

5 hours ago, Springfield said:

 

He reminds me of Haden Christianson in episode 3.

 

You insult yourself and Kylo ren with this slander 

3 hours ago, DogofWar1 said:

Two quick questions, and I was looking in the movie but might've missed it, but who/what was the string the First Order used to track them through hyperspace, and two, was BDT actually the haker they sought or just a random hacker guy?  I kept looking for little narrative queues on both and kept not seeing them but it certainly is possible I missed a line here or there that explained it.

 

The string was just a phrase. As in they are on a leash they aren’t going anywhere thanks to our lightspeed hyperspace tracking. They never explained it beyond that, that it was new tech, and the fact only the first ship could track it for whatever reason. Also this throwaway line from rogue One where she sees some of the tech the empire is working on:

 

 

[Momma There Goes That Man]

As for he code breaker always being BDT, I didn’t get that impression. Just seemed to be complete luck they will need up in a cell with a guy that can escape whenever he wants but never did until that moment 

2 hours ago, Llevron said:

 

Thanks now I'm sad he wasn't 

 

Especially because she didn’t just say his name. Just called him codebreaker. 

 

Made me think they were saving the identity of this person for a reveal. And it would make sense, Lando following the empire/first order tech closely after the fall of the empire thru all his various connections and black markets etc. 

 

missed opportunity to me

[Springfield]

47 minutes ago, Momma There Goes That Man said:

 

You insult yourself and Kylo ren with this slander 

 

He’s such a little pompous **** though.  If he stopped his whining and put on that gangster ass helmet with the badass voice changer then I’d be cool.  But looking as his big ugly nose throws me off.

[elkabong82]

9 hours ago, justice98 said:

 

I thought Lando was gonna come with reinforcements from the Outer Rim.

 

That's what she said!

[Warhead36]

I too thought Kylo was super dorky and lame in TFA but he wasn't as bad in this one. Once he usurped Snoke, he really became a badass. He's still a little petulant though, but I think that just makes him a more interesting character. I bet early in E9 we'll see him do some truly villainous things to show how he's progressed as new leader of the First Order.

[Bacon]

9 hours ago, Momma There Goes That Man said:

 

Kylo and Rey are the best things about this new trilogy and they are some of the best things about the entire series. He is way more engaging than Vader was thru this point in his story. 

 

He doesn’t have to be pure evil to be a good villain. 

 

Seriously.

 

I can't imagine comparing Darth Maul, a useless cartoon cutout version of a bad guy, to Kylo Ren. Kylo actually has a personality, conflicts and motivations. Plus, unlike Hayden Christensen's Anakin, there's a talented actor portraying him.

[Warhead36]

Maul was a badass but he's not a movie carrying villain. He was a henchman. A cool one at that, but that was his role. Not comparable at all to Kylo Ren.

[Hersh]

10 hours ago, Momma There Goes That Man said:

 

Kylo and Rey are the best things about this new trilogy and they are some of the best things about the entire series. He is way more engaging than Vader was thru this point in his story. 

 

He doesn’t have to be pure evil to be a good villain. 

 

Fighting words. Vader was far more mysterious and at a much different point in his characters life than Kylo. A better comparison is Kylo compared to the prequels. 

[Bishop Hammer]

22 minutes ago, Hersh said:

 

Fighting words. Vader was far more mysterious and at a much different point in his characters life than Kylo. A better comparison is Kylo compared to the prequels. 

 

Exactly, except Ben is Anakin in reverse.  When we first meet Darth Vader in the OT he is older and more calculated and controled; far different than the young man we see in the prequels.  At that point he is in control of his emotions to the point where you wonder if he even has any left? The heroic Jedi seemingly gone forever, replaced by the thing that is more machine than man.  When he fought it was with logic, strategy, and only of how to win to get the job done.

 

Ben is still all human and is run by his emotions, like his grandfather before he turned evil.  He is impulsive and will forego the mission for personal reason, like ignoring BB-8 to get Rey; letting the rebel alliance slip through his grasp to go after Luke.  And look at the way he fought his uncle, for that matter.  It was full of rage; out of control and he was fighting strictly because he had a grudge against him.  Vader would never lose control like that.  In his re-match against Obi-Wan he wasn't  frothing at the mouth wanting revenge for severing all his limbs and burning him alive.  He came at him cautiously and measured, trying to pick his spot like he was any other opponent who presented a danger to him.  The fact they had a past history and we're like family meant nothing to the dark overlord.

 

Ben is nothing like Vader, despite desperately wanting to be, because they're not on the same path.  Ben for the most part will turn good again, able to do what Anakin couldn't.

[Warhead36]

Yeah my guess is that this trilogy ends with Rey doing something Luke couldn't: turn Kylo back to the Light and redeem him.

[Mournblade]

1 hour ago, Bacon said:

 

Seriously.

 

I can't imagine comparing Darth Maul, a useless cartoon cutout version of a bad guy, to Kylo Ren. Kylo actually has a personality, conflicts and motivations. Plus, unlike Hayden Christensen's Anakin, there's a talented actor portraying him.

 

That was Maul in the Phantom Menace. You need to check out Maul in the Clone Wars TV Show, Season 4, as voiced by Sam Witwer. He's

an amazing villain in that show. 

[Kosher Ham]

I think it is odd to throw in the cartoons with the movies. 

[Momma There Goes That Man]

Darth Vader was mysterious which was cool and engaging but he was literally an evil robot. 

 

Kylo is all all over the place and I love it. He is really powerful yet he hasn’t learned to control his emotions so he acts out of rage, hatred, impulse etc. plus we are able to see that he is conflicted. I don’t even know that he is a sith or that he wants to be. He seems to me just to be someone that is going to be supremely powerful and do what he wants. We saw none of this in Vader until the final 5 minutes when he out of nowhere flips on the emperor. 

1 minute ago, Kosher Ham said:

I think it is odd to throw in the cartoons with the movies. 

 

Agree. 

18 minutes ago, Bishop Hammer said:

 

Exactly, except Ben is Anakin in reverse.  When we first meet Darth Vader in the OT he is older and more calculated and controled; far different than the young man we see in the prequels.  At that point he is in control of his emotions to the point where you wonder if he even has any left? The heroic Jedi seemingly gone forever, replaced by the thing that is more machine than man.  When he fought it was with logic, strategy, and only of how to win to get the job done.

 

Ben is still all human and is run by his emotions, like his grandfather before he turned evil.  He is impulsive and will forego the mission for personal reason, like ignoring BB-8 to get Rey; letting the rebel alliance slip through his grasp to go after Luke.  And look at the way he fought his uncle, for that matter.  It was full of rage; out of control and he was fighting strictly because he had a grudge against him.  Vader would never lose control like that.  In his re-match against Obi-Wan he wasn't  frothing at the mouth wanting revenge for severing all his limbs and burning him alive.  He came at him cautiously and measured, trying to pick his spot like he was any other opponent who presented a danger to him.  The fact they had a past history and we're like family meant nothing to the dark overlord.

 

Ben is nothing like Vader, despite desperately wanting to be, because they're not on the same path.  Ben for the most part will turn good again, able to do what Anakin couldn't.

 

All this is exactly why he is more interesting and engaging than darth Vader 

[DogofWar1]

After taking in more articles (mostly defending it) as well as getting those answers from above, I think I'm going to amend my score from 7.5 downward to 6.6.

 

The movie isn't a "bad" "Star Wars" movie, and it's a triumph from a visual perspective.

 

But it is "bad" in other ways that just show a failing of Johnson, his screenwriters, and some producers to make a satisfying experience; primarily he fails miserably at telling the story he's trying to tell.

 

I actually like the direction he's trying to take the series, the idea of freeing Star Wars from the cycle of being 4-6 again is a good one.  Freeing the series from another Emperor figure and replacing him with Ren is a good idea.

 

But his execution is poorly done.  Too many curious choices, too many unexplained bits, too many things lost in the rush, and really that's what it is, a rush, to kill off the old Star Wars order and institute a new one.
 

I had much longer comments, but I decided to shorten them:

 - Snoke backstory being left out makes him nothing more than a narrative tool for Ben in a universe where Snoke's existence definitely has a longer explanation.  Bad writing.

 - Bad writing to have Snoke make some long winded speech about reading minds and then miss a huge thing like "I'm gonna kill you."

 - Bad writing with the whole "end of a string" thing.  Don't make it a hidden reference, just tell us that they've perfected a previous Empire program.

 - Who the hell was Benicio Del Toro?  What he codebreaker?  If he was why no explanation?  If he wasn't why was codebreaker special?  Also, too much of a coincidence to be in the same jail cell.  Come on.

 - Everything Finn did was pointless.  I mean, except him bringing Benicio Del Toro in to the mix which got almost everyone killed...  It just feels like bad narrative planning.

 

This is aside from the various other minor gripes or curious decisions I could talk about (slow bombers were silly, Leia's spacewalk was silly, Luke generally, some chekov guns left on the mantle).

 

5 hours ago, Momma There Goes That Man said:

The string was just a phrase. As in they are on a leash they aren’t going anywhere thanks to our lightspeed hyperspace tracking. They never explained it beyond that, that it was new tech, and the fact only the first ship could track it for whatever reason. Also this throwaway line from rogue One where she sees some of the tech the empire is working on:

 

Nice reference.  I just wish they actually made it a reference in the movie instead of hiding it in all those "string" statements.  Like, they couldn't have had Hux say an engineer made a breakthrough on an old Empire project?  Sigh.

 

5 hours ago, Momma There Goes That Man said:

As for he code breaker always being BDT, I didn’t get that impression. Just seemed to be complete luck they will need up in a cell with a guy that can escape whenever he wants but never did until that moment

 

This kind of thing drives me up a wall.  A couple lines of dialogue could have cleared all of that up and made it fit.  Instead, we, the audience, are asked to either fill in the gap that he's codebreaker, or suspend our disbelief that 1) other people of similar skillset exist despite the skill supposedly being super rare, 2) that he just so happened to be in that jail cell at that exact time.  Come. On.

[Springfield]

He’s like my 3 year old if he doesn’t get his way.  Not a trained Jedi who apparently has the most unbridled power out there.  ****ing keep your self under control.  I just don’t buy this super powerful Jedi who major anxiety issues.

 

Ren should have been pure evil by now.  He showed it a littl after he killed Snoke, but still with ththe waffling, mentally tormented mess.  One movie left for Ren to go full on evil and then be either killed (quick and simple) or turn back to the light (long and complicated or else they **** it all up).

[Mournblade]

4 minutes ago, Springfield said:

He’s like my 3 year old if he doesn’t get his way.  Not a trained Jedi who apparently has the most unbridled power out there.  ****ing keep your self under control.  I just don’t buy this super powerful Jedi who major anxiety issues.

 

Ren should have been pure evil by now.  He showed it a littl after he killed Snoke, but still with ththe waffling, mentally tormented mess.  One movie left for Ren to go full on evil and then be either killed (quick and simple) or turn back to the light (long and complicated or else they **** it all up).

 

I think the viciousness with which he went after Luke's projection in the end showed his commitment to the Dark Side. 

[Momma There Goes That Man]

I don’t think he has to be full evil at all. They are moving away from that type of structure. Life is more complicated than full bad and full good which is part of what cost the Jedi in the prequels, their antiquated beliefs in rigid structure 

 

This is much more intriguing to me than “super evil bad guy” again. At least if Ren turns it will actually make sense and be setup over two movies rather than the baddest mother****er in the galaxy just out of nowhere saying “eh turns out I kinda like my son. Sorry guys”

[NoCalMike]

The one problem I have with the entire "turn back to the light side" angle in the Star Wars universe is.....does that make them not culpable for their actions while they were seduced by the darkside?  Like, "oh hey sorry about all that mass murdering of the rebel alliance and stuff....but hey, the dark side is a real son of a......right?"

[Momma There Goes That Man]

4 minutes ago, NoCalMike said:

The one problem I have with the entire "turn back to the light side" angle in the Star Wars universe is.....does that make them not culpable for their actions while they were seduced by the darkside?  Like, "oh hey sorry about all that mass murdering of the rebel alliance and stuff....but hey, the dark side is a real son of a......right?"

 

Lol well the only person that did it died. And it’s not like Vader would be forgiven for murdering billions of people tho he is a bit romanticized for his hand in overthrowing the empire he helped create. Do we credit the arsonist for finally putting out his fire? 

 

I dont think he will turn because I think they are playing the whole turn dynamic up too much. It’s also clear they want to subvert expectations and move away from the story arcs of the OT. So I think he will die. 

[Cooked Crack]

I think the whole Snoke ending would have worked better if the strike didn't kill him. Wound Snoke but then have Kylo and Rey fight him. We'd miss the fight with the guards but it would be more satisfying than what they gave us. Beating an injured Snoke can save face for fans thinking he was going to be the big bad.