Star Wars: The Last Jedi - Re-Review
I wanted to rewatch this movie and give some more thoughts on it. I picked up the Blu-Ray a few days ago and watched it twice since I saw it in theaters and see if any of my thoughts have changed any.
Another reason I wanted to see if my thoughts have changed was because this is probably the most divisive movie in the entire Star Wars saga. Some love it, some hate it. Some of the ones who hate it even call it the worst movie in the whole franchise. Wow.
As some of you probably saw in my original review, I said that I loved this movie. I still do, but I want to go more into why I love it and don't get the hate. To be honest, I just had very few flaws with it, not all the humor works, wasn't a fan of Vice Admiral Holdo, and I do think Canto Bight should've been trimmed down a bit. I know I'm not the only one who loves this movie, as there are lots of videos on YouTube showing that people love the movie.
We live in a culture where we hype something up so much in our heads, that when the movie does something different, it's worse than the prequels. Just because the movie didn't do what you wanted doesn't mean it's bad. It's not all about you, it's the filmmaker's decision, in this case it was Rian Johnson's decision. He did what he wanted to do and I think he did a really good job. All (well not all) The Force Awakens had to do was be better than the prequels to be a success, and it was, and The Last Jedi had to actually do a good job at following up with that, and I think that it did.
Also, Star Wars fans do not like it if you say that you like this movie.
Oh, and if this just looks like a mess talking about how much I liked The Last Jedi, it is. When there's so much to talk about it's kinda hard to keep it organized.
One major complaint I hear is how Luke Skywalker was handled. Apparently that was "character assassination". Mark Hamill didn't like where Rian was going with Luke at first, but he has come to peace with it and said that Rian made a great film. In fact, this is probably one of Mark Hamill's best portrayals of Luke in the series. Some fans are completely against seeing their favorite characters, like Luke Skywalker, being flawed in any way. Fans complained that Luke wasn't the awesome, powerful, Grand Master they were hoping to see after Return of the Jedi, and instead they got a tired, grumpy, old, damaged, and hopeless hermit instead. Also, the idea of a girl going to a planet where Luke has isolated himself from the Force and the Jedi was originally thought up by George Lucas himself.
Luke Skywalker is not a god, he is a man. A man who people were expecting to be god-like and it broke him, that's an interesting place to take his arc. When he tosses the lightsaber, it probably brings up bad memories for him. Memories of failiure. Learning that one of the Empire's leaders was his father, starting a whole new Jedi Order, and his nephew killing the students and starting the First Order.
Also, people hated when he drank the milk from that alien thing. That was just a little throwaway scene that's not really worth getting angry over. I watched the scene, chuckled a little bit, and got on with my life. It also was funny seeing him trying to teach Rey and he tickles her hand with a leaf.
I do love the scene where Yoda shows up right before Luke is about to burn the Ahch-To Jedi Temple and library, but Yoda does it for him and then tells him that Rey has learned all she needs to know and that Luke should learn from his mistakes. You could interpret Yoda's destruction of the Jedi books and saying "page turners, they were not" as Disney canning the Expanded Universe.
And I think his death was great. When he fights Kylo Ren on Crait but it turns out that he wasn't really there and tells Kylo Ren that he will not be the last Jedi before fading away is great. It turns out that he was using the Force to project himself on Crait from Ahch-To. There's one thing we didn't know that you could do with the Force. According to the novelization of The Last Jedi (which I have never read), Luke does die physically, but before he does he becomes one with the Force, like Obi-Wan and Yoda did. I think his death was a great ending to his story and the main story will continue in Episode IX.
I really liked the scene where he was in the Millennium Falcon, mourning Han Solo and R2-D2 tries to get Luke to come back by playing the hologram of Leia from A New Hope. That was awesome.
It is a little weird how he tries to kill Kylo Ren just because he saw a little bit of darkness in him even though he said he couldn't kill Vader because there was still some light in him. I think I've said all I can about Luke that I could think of, now let's talk about another character that characters hated how they were handled.
I was not expecting Snoke's death after Kylo Ren turns on the lightsaber with the Force and then Rey and Kylo kill all of Snoke's guards. Fans hated that scene because Snoke just dies in the second act without us knowing anything about him and that's it. If you think about it, they did the same with Palpatine in the original trilogy. Before the prequels existed, we really didn't have much to know about Palpatine. Palpatine was only seen as a mysterious hologram that Vader serves, same with Snoke and Kylo Ren. Palpatine is killed by his apprentice, just like Snoke. See? Snoke is a lot like Palpatine before the prequels were made. Also, I'm sure there will be a novel soon explaining Snoke's backstory.
Another thing I've heard people complain about is Finn and Rose's subplot. I will admit, this could've been trimmed down in the movie, and when Finn and Rose see the guy with the red flower, they just get arrested and thrown into a cell, kinda making you wonder "ok, what was the point of that?" but they get a new codebreaker played by Benicio del Toro who just betrays them for the First Order. Ok?
It does have some amazing scenes, like when Finn and Rose unleash all those fathiers from their pens and they stampede through Canto Bight and then DJ and BB-8 pick them up on a ship that DJ stole.
I also really liked the scene where the slave child on Canto Bight picked up the broom with the Force before the credits started.
One complaint that I've heard that I do kinda agree with is that Holdo should've told Poe her plan from the beginning to evacuate the Rebel Alliance down to Crait. When her plan is revealed, Poe sends Rose, Finn and BB-8 to Canto Bight to find a codebreaker.
Some people were complaining that Admiral Ackbar had a meaningless and ignored death. Admiral Ackbar, despite being a fan favorite, was never a major character to begin with, so he didn't need a huge death anyway.
I want to briefly talk about Holdo's hyperspace maneuver into Snoke's ship. People are always like "why not use that against the Death Star?", but a video by YouTube channel Star Wars Explained who, well explains, that jumping to hyperspace isn't always the best idea. He also said that we don't know that much about hyperspace in Star Wars, and he also said that maybe she didn't do it in an act of confidence, but desperation to get the First Order to focus on her rather than the Rebel Alliance, and that hyperspace ramming is rather unlikely too.
Also, it's not like hyperspace ramming is a new thing in Star Wars. In the Revenge of the Sith Incredible Cross Sections book mentions a ship that did the same to a planet, but that falls under Legends now. Another thing I want to say is that scene is probably one of the most amazing shots in the entire Star Wars franchise.
Now I want to talk about when the First Order blows up the Resistance ship after Kylo Ren refuses to pull the trigger and Leia flies out. I truly thought that scene was how Leia was going to die in the movie but she didn't. To half the fanbase, it's an amazing scene, but to others it's one of the dumbest things ever because she just flies back to the ship with the Force. You guys do know that she has a natural affinity for the Force because her brother was Luke Skywalker and her father was Darth Vader? Can we all just accept that she has the Force?
I think what would've been better was if Leia had died, but Kylo had to live with the fact that he didn't pull the trigger.
I also really liked the scenes with Rey and Kylo Ren's Force connection and it turns out that Snoke was connecting the two all along. The scene with Rey in the mirror cave just looks amazing. After they kill Snoke, Rey tells Ben that they have to help the Resistance, but he tells her to let the past die. Also, when Kylo Ren told her that her parents were nobodies who sole her for drinking money and fans said that was anti-climatic, did you actually believe him when he said that? He was probably lying to her so he could bring her to the dark side.
Another complaint I hear is that Rian Johnson's humor sucks. I will admit that not all of it works, but some of it does. There's one scene where you see what looks to be a ship but it's just an iron on Snoke's ship when Finn, Rose, and DJ pretend to work there. Ok? The scene in the beginning with Poe and Hux was kinda funny, but it didn't really fit. It felt more like something out of Guardians of the Galaxy than Star Wars. I actually kinda chuckled when Finn called Captain Phasma "Chromedome". I did like the porgs and didn't think they were annoying, I truly thought that they were going to be the Ewoks of the sequel trilogy. I can't help but smile in the scene where Chewbacca was about to eat a cooked porg and he scares the alive ones away but then he feels bad and doesn't want to eat anymore.
Can't really think of much else to say, so that was Star Wars: The Last Jedi. To be honest, I don't understand why people hate it so much, I would call this one of my favorite Star Wars movies. If you dislike this movie, go ahead, keep on disliking it, to each his own, I just don't get why you don't like it.
Well, I'll see you tomorrow with a review of Solo: A Star Wars Story.
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Next review - Solo: A Star Wars Story
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