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

(Spoilers) The thing that made the original trilogy great was that Darth Vader was a great villain. The emperor was also a great villain, and the movies were filled with adventure, on an epic scale. This movie is quite the opposite. The villain is essentially discarded, along with his... half-Jedi bodyguards?... whoever they are... can they see? There's no backstory for Snoke, or his abilities, but, it turns out that it's inconsequential, just like him! People might argue that we don't need to know, but that's silly. Why not use that as an opportunity to link these movies to the already established universe? There's no link to the past.

There's nothing an audience hates more than an inconsequential villain. The movie's "adventure" was really just them running away for the ENTIRE movie. Part of what made the other movies great was the fact that they travel to different planets, and see different, alien worlds. Hoth, Degoba, that moon with the Ewoks, Leia's homeworld that got blown up, Luke's homeworld with two suns, and Jabba the hut, that asteroid field with the big worm, etc. etc.

Also, I felt it was a huge plot hole that the first order, in their massive ships, capable of faster than light travel, were having trouble catching up to the rebels. Which is unfortunately, the entire plot of the movie. They can't call in a couple of extra ships to block their way? They "can't cover" kylo ren, so he has to retreat? He wasn't even being shot at, and it looked like he could have taken the rebels out by himself... They couldn't have had one ship jump to just in front of them? They're literally euchred by a slow moving ship? Leia can survive in space? She opened a door directly to space and nobody even got sucked out? You need an airlock, bro!

What is the point of Luke confronting Kylo from a distance? He should have pulled an Obi-Wan, at least, and disappeared, leaving a pile of clothes... which he kind of did, but from a distance? WHY??? Also, what the fuck is with Luke, in general? He's a pretty happy go-lucky character originally. Why change his character so dramatically, for no reason? It is just a shit movie. There's no reconciling this movie, with the original trilogy, or even The Force Awakens, which was fine, or Rogue One, which was good. It's just a stinky pile of crap, and it's really disappointing to see Luke end that way, and Snoke end that way. Also, when they're going to execute Finn and that ugly woman, who chose to bring the laser axe on board? Like, why did they pack that?

The entire plot line of that ugly woman was pretty lame, also. She probably could have been safely omitted from the movie. Also, Poe, their most interesting character (due to the fact that he's a badass pilot, and seemingly pretty resourceful guy), gets totally neutered for basically the whole movie, and is completely ineffectual. Another thing I hate to see in a strong character, total inability to make a positive contribution.

The biggest blow to the bad guys is from purple-hair - whats-her-name? A character they introduced briefly, and then sacrifice. A thing that makes sacrifice great, is the emotional attachment you feel when a character you identify with makes the choice to end their life in support of something greater than themselves. But, no, nobody identified with this purple haired woman, because she was on screen for a total of 1 minute. Also, if those other ships were running out of gas (which has never been an issue before in the Star Wars universe, and is a stupid, contrived plot crutch, like kryptonite everything in Superman), why didn't they turn around and go into lightspeed into the cruisers? Seems like, they should have. Nobody thought of it? You've got all these tactical minds that are hardened from years of resistance - trained militants, and none of them think, "we've got this giant rocket we could launch at them at the speed of light, and it's about to run out of gas anyway", except at the very end? Why wouldn't that purple haired woman think of that before, since those other ships were already going to be blown up? Stupid! It just didn't follow basic logic.

I did think it was a pretty stupid nod to vegetarianism when Chewbacca decides not to eat the bird love child of a minion and the cat from shrek. That brings me to another point - the silly, weird humor, and the cutesy weird animals. They're unnecessary, and unwelcome. Sure, the original series had ewoks, but people generally didn't like the ewoks, because they were too cutesy.

Anyway, as sad as it is for me to say, I'll probably never watch another star wars movie in theatres.

R.I.P. Old buddy.