½ December 20, 2017
Star Wars: TLJ is a film with amazing potential. The Force Awakens really set it up well-- Rey's power on the rise, Kylo's internal conflicts, the death of Solo. It felt like star wars itself was awakened as we revisited what felt like the real Star Wars universe for the first time since episode 6.
The best things about this movie:
- The in-depth look at the force as more than a mysterious background noise.
- The lightsaber fights.
- The space action
- Kylo and Rey's development / storyline.
Literally everything else about this movie missed the mark. Honestly, so much of this movie happens without changing anything that you could edit out entire swaths of it without changing the end result. In fact, if you did edit out entire swaths of it, you'd have a much better movie. I'd sincerely give this movie 1.5 stars / 5-- one for Rey and Kylo, and half of one for Finn & Rose-- because Finn at least pulled his weight in that storyline.
From here on out, there will be spoilers ahead_______
The storyline progresses down several side plots-- we have Finn and Rose, Poe and Leia, Rey and Kylo, and then the relevant side characters that surround those plotlines. Let's start with the good one-- Rey and Kylo's development as Kylo feels a pull to the light, and Rey's (albeit markedly smaller) pull towards darkness. It was incredibly well done-- except that Snokes and Luke were garbage.
Snokes was such a fan favorite since The Force Awakens; who is he? What does he want? What is he going to do with Kylo? Well, never meet your villains, kids, because this guy goes from being a mysterious knife in the dark, pulling the strings of fate to suit his vile dreams to... an emperor palpatine rip off in a gold robe who gets bested by his own damn apprentice, while spewing some poorly written dialogue about how Kylo was about to "kill his true enemy". Jesus Christ Abram, the most Forced thing in this movie is your contrived script.
Then we have Luke-- or should I say, Mark Hamill as himself. Have you ever wanted to see a jedi who's so cocky he literally brushes his shoulder off after surviving a volley of AT-AT fire? How about him drink green milk straight from a strange alien's teet? How about Luke running up a hill with a torch trying to burn down ancient jedi texts while Yoda laughs and blows it up for him? There are two types of luke available in this movie: Luke as if he had never learned anything since episode 4 and cocky fan service. Somehow, he's more naive than Rey or Kylo, and his actions supposedly sealed Kylo's fate as going to the dark side. This is the opposite of everything Luke was famous for-- seeing the good in Vader. And let's not forget that, after 1 day of training Rey, she bests him in a lightsaber duel. Honestly, I don't know why Luke didn't ask Mary Sue for training because clearly she is already a master.
As for Finn and Rose; Finn is basically a repeat of what we've already seen in 7. He starts off wanting to run from the fight, but ends the movie willing to literally die for the cause. Ok, cool. It was good the first time at least. They also open up an interesting moral quandary: those who sell weapons to the Imperials *also* sell to the rebels. What do they do with this information though? Immediately forget that. Trash their casino and call it even. Yay? My main problems with this storyline is that Rose, as a character, makes no sense, and nothing the pair of them do actually matters in the end.
Rose idolizes Finn when they first meet, because he's a "brave hero". Of course, she also just HAPPENS to meet him as he's trying to flee the ship... so now she hates him, because he's trying to run while her sister just gave her life for his cause. Awesome! Great storytelling. Now what do they do with this?
The two of them, along with an assist from Poe, hatch a plan to stop the tracking device on Snoke's ship from being able to trace them. Good plan. Sounds reasonable. Long shot but they don't have another option. Or at least they don't THINK they have another option because Captain Purple Hair (I forget her name) decides to not tell Poe that they have a plan that will likely save them all. That's it. Purple just calls him a flyboy and dismisses him, despite the fact that he usually has a command role on the ship and just wants to know what's going on so he knows his people will be safe. She has no reason to do this. It's incredibly forced conflict.
And why is purple hair even in the movie? Because Leia's command center got blown up, with her in it. This would have been a serious, breathtaking moment... but she literally Mary Poppins herself back into the ship. Apparently, she's not just force sensitive, she can use force pull to save her life while in the vacuum of space. Without a leader, they go under the command of captain Purple, who we've not even seen on camera up until her promotion, and she is immediately hostile to a beloved character-- Poe-- for no reason. My girlfriend Nicole even said she thought that Purple was going to be some sort of traitor, for how unlikeable they were making Purple out to be.
But it's a damn good thing she wasn't-- because Finn and Rose's plan fails miserably. They don't end up affecting the overall story at all, except that now Finn is courageous enough to sacrificing himself in a head on crash... and Rose apparently loves him now. And kisses him. Randomly. I literally thought she still hated him when she was about to crash into him, and then 3 seconds later she's like "I love you". It was jarring and... say it with me again, Forced.
And what does Purple end up doing? Not a damned thing. The whole "I didn't want to tell you the plan" subplot is resolved by her eventually telling him the plan. I can't even make this up. And then she stays behind and... heroically sacrifices herself? WHY? She was being dismissive of her underlings not half an hour ago and suddenly she'd die for them rather than set the ship on auto pilot? The most damning thing about her is that I was happy to see her character die off. I am more likely to see episode 9 if I know she will not be in it.
But my main problem with this movie is this single theme with all my prior complaints: So much of it doesn't matter in the end. That's probably summed up best by Luke's final moments. He goes to battle not as himself, but as an illusion. A stall tactic. I thought, oh awesome, that's a great explanation for how he manages to survive a volley of AT-ATs *and* kylo at the same time. I guess that means we'll see him in episode 9! But we won't, because right after that battle, he dies for no reason and joins the force. Cool. Literally nothing in this movie leads to anything, as the plot fails to progress by continually undermining itself at every turn.
So it's at this point you're probably thinking, "I thought you said this movie had potential?" ABSOLUTELY. Now, in an act of great hubris, let me fix it for them.
1. Delete Captain Purple. She's unlikeable, forgettable (I am not calling her captain purple out of disrespect but because I literally can't remember her name), and *redundant*, as she's just Princess Leia but not good in any way.
2. When Leia is about to get blown up, instead of Mary Poppins-ing via deus ex machina, have a nameless underling sacrifice himself (or herself) to save her-- maybe that person throws Leia off the command deck and closes the airlock right before the missile hits. Leia then sees the floating corpse of someone who died for her. She's asked many to die for her on the battlefield before, but this time, it's different. It changes her.
3. When "someone stays behind" on the ship, make that Leia. Leia then sacrifices herself for the resistance that she loves. This inspires the resistance to rally as they really did love her as their leader.
4. When Rose and Finn are on Snoke's ship, make their original plan fail still, because if it doesn't, then Leia's sacrifice isn't needed. Instead, have Rose, who's wiretapping the ship, hear that they have a Jedi on board-- Finn, who loves Rey, goes to save her, literally storming two Sith Lords alone. This act of courage is what finally redeems him in Rose's eyes. They join the fight against the dozen or so Elite guard (which, by the way, Rey and Kylo SHOULD NOT have been able to beat by themselves). Kylo then asks Rey to join him... by asking her to kill Finn. She declines, and Kylo tries to kill Finn out of rage, but Rose sacrifices herself to save him. Then, when she delivers the line about "Its not about killing what you hate, its about saving what you love"-- she isn't talking about her loving him, because obviously why would she? It's about him loving Rey, and that she thought that love is important to keeping the resistance alive. Finn and Rey flee, but Kylo does not pursue as he knows he can't beat both of them.
5. With Leia and Han gone, and his new apprentice already very skilled in the force, Luke joins the Force willingly, to be with his sister and best friend again. There's nothing more for him in this world.
This improves the movie by making the sacrifices in it more meaningful and the characters be more consistent overall. It would cut down on the amount of Poe in the movie (which is a damned shame as he may be my favorite character in 7), but it would still be better for it in the end.
Underseer, you sound very much like a bot yourself. It doesn't look like you read anything I wrote nor the reviews I posted. Just another of your many kneejerk, groundless accusations of another poster of being right wing.
