Review of Star Wars: The Last Jedi (2017) by Ludashea — 27 Dec 2017

I don't normally write film reviews, but wanted to get my thoughts on this movie out there only because I care so much about this franchise. I am not a die hard fan, but I am someone who loves movies and grew up watching the original trilogy as a kid.

Over the years it grew to become one of my all-time favorite sagas and I was genuinely excited when Disney announced they bought the franchise and were going to make a new "Skywalker saga" trilogy.

I thought the Force Awakens (TFA) was good, but not great. They played it safe, but understandably so from a business perspective. Rogue One was excellent, and I thought, really showed how they could expand the film universe in exciting ways.

Together I had high hopes for how they could develop the new trilogy and enrich the new characters while rounding out the Skywalker Sage (as they now call it). However, when I saw this movie not only did they not round out that saga, they essentially killed it.

This second movie is almost entirely disjunctive from TFA. Whole thematic elements are abandoned or developed in an entirely about face manner. Having reflected on it, it doesn't even make sense from a story perspective.

It honestly feels as though they did it solely to say they took risks or made a "risky" film. I mean virtually nothing was developed ... Rey's apparent force abilities, Snoke's recruitment of Ben Solo, the mystery of Luke's saber calling to Rey .

... nothing. Not only that, but new elements like the force tree, the first Jedi temple, ancient Jedi texts, NOTHING. It honestly felt like a 2 year bait and switch. Which is one thing in terms of expectation, but what about story-telling? The result is a complete mess.

Rey has unreal force abilities without any Jedi training, while Luke the son of Anakin Skywalker who was created through a virgin birth of force needs weeks of training with a 900 year old Jedi master?! Kylo Ren's arc of struggling with the light was completely obliterated with the result that he is merely bad because he is.

No fall from grace, no tragedy, nothing. In addition, what about Luke and Leia. Seriously?! We waited since 1983 for the return of Luke Skywalker, you build it up with him standing on the cliff ... and he throws the saber over his shoulder like a piece of trash?! Setting aside the idiotic place you put him from a character perspective, you really think he would disrespect the saber Ben saved from Anakin all those years, gave to him as his first saber .

.. even out of respect for Ben and Anakin that seems absurd. I mean, really. Plus, how does a man who abandoned his training with Yoda when he sensed his friends were in trouble on Bespin and refused to lose hope in his father despite his allegiance to the Emperor completely give up his commission from Yoda to "pass on what you have learned" since he would be "the Last Jedi" all because he sensed evil in a 15 year old kid? Really? He would hide out for 30 something years while his sister is pleading for him to come home and allow his best friend to be murdered.

Honestly makes absolutely no sense. I could go on and on. Stepping further back plot points make no sense. A 2 hour space chase scene?! Really you had three years to write a sequel and that was your concept? Or Space Leia - how disrespectful to Carrie's memory.

Ugh. Honestly, this movie was heartbreaking at almost every level. I have lost faith in Lucasfilm after this. Seriously who authorized this piece of garbage? I truly hope they can right course, but I feel like the damage has been done.

I mean, really, if anything required kid gloves it was rounding out "the Skywalker Saga" (again their term) and how they treated characters like Luke and Leia Skywalker ... and they gave us this.

It's a bell that cannot be unrung. I am completely cool with going a new direction, but there were dozens of ways to do that while still honoring the prior films. This again felt like going a different direction because they received flak for TFA being too safe.

They wanted a bold movie, but bold for its own sake rather than one drive by the characters or story. The result is they ended up damaging the new trilogy and ruining the Skywalker legacy, which instead they have a responsibility to handle carefully.

RIP in Star Wars.