Star Wars: Episode VIII ***Speculation & Spoilers***

[Cdog923]

You realize that thread is a praise of how they portrayed Han, not a criticism, right?

I do, but that doesn't mean I agree with her summation. Han is utterly broken by his ending in TFA and that's not what I wanted, or expected, for that character. 

 

[Landlord]

I do, but that doesn't mean I agree with her summation. Han is utterly broken by his ending in TFA and that's not what I wanted, or expected, for that character. 

What iconic character in a movie franchise would you be okay with being written into an arc of sadness/despair/brokenness? Should all of them only be heroes or be written in a way where they are destined to become more wise, more complete, more mature, more heroic? Writing a messy, painful arc for a character isn't disrespectful to the character - in fact, I'd argue the opposite. Giving a character 'plot armor' where they have nowhere to go but up is bad writing and makes a character not a character at all, but a caricature.

 

[zoogs]

I tend to think characters getting broken down over time is more fascinating than things staying awesome forever. Agree with Landlord.

In my last post I referenced a review but didn't post the actual link! Here it is: http://www.slashfilm.com/the-last-jedi-defense/

Hamil has talked about how he initially was dismayed at what had happened to Luke and then Rian Johnson sold him on it. Some gripers are trying to spin this in a weird way so they can imagine Hamil as on their side. The dismay at discovering what's happened to Luke is kind of the entire point. If Luke rebuilt the Jedi order and just kicked a$$ the rest of the way there wouldn't be a very interesting story to tell that isn't centered around him, and a showcase of good guys wiping out waves and waves of more bad guys. 

Passage from the slashfilm review:

Luke’s hopelessness is especially affecting because the film is clearly on his side. This is not a movie where a plucky young Jedi-to-be shows up at the old master’s doorstep and teaches him how to hope again. This is a movie where a flawed old man with a lifetime of victories and regrets informs the decisions of a new generation of young heroes who need to find a new way to hope. Clearly, the old ways didn’t work because darkness rises again and there are still tyrannical man-babies trying to be the next Darth Vader. There’s a flaw in the system, buried too deep for most to see, and the only solution is to burn it all down. (...)

That revolution feels especially well-timed, as fans discuss whether or not “Luke would have done that.” Geeky debates will always exist (they’re the reason Star Wars thrives today), but maybe we should hone in on what The Last Jedi is telling us. Maybe it’s dangerous to worship our heroes to the point of idolatry, to convince ourselves that they can never do wrong, never make mistakes, and never let their hubris create monsters that threaten a new generation. Johnson sends Luke out on a high note, allowing him one more showdown with his former pupil in a fight that is pacifistic resistance at its most grand and extreme, but it’s the final gasp of the hero we once knew. Long live Luke Skywalker…but never forget that he erred. That he done f'd up.

 

[Redux]

Yeah I really like how Luke reached the pinnacle of Jedi status yet in Ep.8 we still see the same man we left in Ep.6.  He didn't become an Obi Wan, he is still most definitely Luke and conflicted about his feelings.  I can not praise Hamil enough for the outstanding performance he gave.

 

[Cdog923]

What iconic character in a movie franchise would you be okay with being written into an arc of sadness/despair/brokenness? Should all of them only be heroes or be written in a way where they are destined to become more wise, more complete, more mature, more heroic? Writing a messy, painful arc for a character isn't disrespectful to the character - in fact, I'd argue the opposite. Giving a character 'plot armor' where they have nowhere to go but up is bad writing and makes a character not a character at all, but a caricature.

That's not the point, though; character progressions like that have to fit narratively with how the character has already been portrayed, which I would argue they haven't done with both Han and (especially) Luke. You can make these iconic characters vulnerable without going completely Jon Snow on them (strongest plot armor ever). 

"“I said to Rian, ‘Jedis don’t give up.’ I mean, even if [Luke] had a problem, he would maybe take a year to try and regroup, but if he made a mistake, he would try and right that wrong, so right there, we had a fundamental difference."

http://collider.com/the-last-jedi-mark-hamill-on-luke-skywalker/#rian-johnson-disney

This entire discussion should be taken with the caveat that we still have one more film to go, and we don't yet know what direction they're going to take Luke in. I'd almost bet my house that he becomes a Force Ghost, though. 

 

[zoogs]

Yes, and if we this trilogy set ten years ago with Luke, Han, and Leia still as the protagonists, that's probably more along the kind of story we would tell. Or if we had a decades-long running comic book series featuring Luke's excellent adventures...you get the idea. However, Luke's story has been told. And portraying him in a way that preserves an idealized version of his hero-idol ascension -- making it a permanent one in the face of any minor, quickly-resolved stumbles -- would have been a far greater disservice to his character. Though it would have been satisfying, for sure.

TLJ and the new trilogy as a whole really makes a point of grappling with the question of legends. Behind the power of how they're received, who are they underneath?...e.g, Rose is star struck by Finn but then realizes he's cutting and running. And she surpasses her hero. Rey (and everyone) knows the legend of the great Luke Skywalker, but she surpasses him, too. Kylo is caught up chasing the image of Darth Vader, and it consumes him and causes him to strive for terrible things. The nice thing about Rey surpassing Luke, too, is it's not portrayed as a repudiation of him, it's a passing of the torch. Luke got it wrong with Ben, seriously wrong. But he got it right with Rey, and with one magnificent final assist he allows the 'spark to light the flame' to endure. That will go down as perhaps the most legendary thing Luke has ever done, and it's a beautiful culmination for him.

 

[Cdog923]

We can agree to disagree; I'm not fully on board with some of the portrayals, but that's fine if you are. 

 

[zoogs]

Not a problem, of course!

Here's someone who says it better than I did: https://www.themarysue.com/hamill-star-wars-franchise-grow-up/ (emphasis mine)

Luke Skywalker: Totally the type of dude who’d remove himself from the equation to further the Resistance.

So, where does that leave Luke? Basically, it leaves him struggling with the thing that every great Master in any discipline must struggle with: the moment at which to let go and move on, leaving the art/industry/fight to their students. Giving them the freedom and faith to make it their own. Luke eventually takes himself out of the equation … but not before righting one last wrong by giving Kylo Ren his comeuppance.

Throughout the original trilogy, Luke learns that running in with a lightsaber isn’t a solution. He leaves the Rebellion in Return of the Jedi because he thought it more important to go and try to save Darth Vader from the Dark Side. He then chooses to leave the Rebellion after that and train other young Jedi.

His entire thing is:

1. It’s not just about running in with a lightsaber and looking badass.
   
2. Saving people from the Dark Side is more important than taking them out.
   
3. It’s not about him. It’s about what’s best for the resistance.
   

To me, not only was the Luke in The Last Jedi true to character, he was peak Luke Skywalker. This was Luke Skywalker applying what he learned over the course of the other films. I loved that.

... Jedi knowledge is now in the hands of a former scavenger without a lineage of importance. That’s huge.

I think it is also a matter of fan perspective, too. I'm in the exact same boat as Teresa Jusino, the author: "...seen all the Star Wars films prior this one but considers TFA the true beginning of [my] love for the Star Wars franchise." That's not everyone, but it is me and I think a lot of newer fans who grew up when Star Wars was iconic but the modern representations were the prequels and the cartoons. Star Wars was a pop culture thing I liked, among many others. I always enjoy a good lightsaber battle. Now, though, it's vaulted into one of my favorite things ever.

I'm not trying to sway anyone who doesn't want to be, just offering up all the ways I really appreciate about what they're doing with this.

 

[Landlord]

That's not the point, though; character progressions like that have to fit narratively with how the character has already been portrayed, which I would argue they haven't done with both Han and (especially) Luke. You can make these iconic characters vulnerable without going completely Jon Snow on them (strongest plot armor ever). 

"“I said to Rian, ‘Jedis don’t give up.’ I mean, even if [Luke] had a problem, he would maybe take a year to try and regroup, but if he made a mistake, he would try and right that wrong, so right there, we had a fundamental difference."

http://collider.com/the-last-jedi-mark-hamill-on-luke-skywalker/#rian-johnson-disney

This entire discussion should be taken with the caveat that we still have one more film to go, and we don't yet know what direction they're going to take Luke in. I'd almost bet my house that he becomes a Force Ghost, though. 

If Luke's character had never given up in the 30 years between Ep 6/Ep 7, there would be no story to tell in Ep 7. He would have trained a new generation of Jedi, he would have remained the constant hope of the galaxy, they would have squashed any First Order uprising and it would be Star Wars: Everything is Cool and Chill.

Besides, Luke's brokenness and shame and guilt actually fits perfectly with his character. Think about his story. He didn't even hear about the Force until he was 19. Spends three years just doing the civil war thing with no Force training and minimal knowledge of how to interact with it. Then spent, what... a few weeks at most training with Yoda? Was only able to kind of defeat Vader by channeling his rage/emotional connection to the people he loved. 

So we're to believe that a powerfully Force-connected young adult with virtually no formal training and with deep emotional attachments is supposed to end up as a wise, stoic, classic template sort of Jedi master? Doesn't make any sense to me. What does make perfect sense to me is that while being incredibly powerful and learning a ton through teaching himself, he would have serious flaws and inconsistencies in his mastery of the Force and by extension, be susceptible to the temptations of the dark side due to his love of friends, his passion, etc.

i think where we find Luke is believable and even fits what we know about him from the OT.

 

[Redux]

Luke had roughly a day and a half at most getting tutelage from Obi Wan, then 2-4 days MAX training with Yoda.  And I believe it was confirmed canon thst he never went back to train further with Yoda 

So yeah...anyone that has gripes about Rey learing too quickly or whatever...

 

[knapplc]

Is Rey the best character, and the best-portrayed character, in all of the movies?

For all my (legitimate) gripes about the last two franchise films, she's a huge shining bright spot. 

Just wondering if anyone else has another contender for best character/actor. 

 

[Landlord]

Is Rey the best character, and the best-portrayed character, in all of the movies?

For all my (legitimate) gripes about the last two franchise films, she's a huge shining bright spot. 

Just wondering if anyone else has another contender for best character/actor. 

I think so. They've written her very well, and Daisy Ridley is incredible. I also think that the big 4 of the new trilogy are all generally fantastic. I like what they did with Poe's arc in Ep VIII, and felt bad for Finn's, because those two are also both incredibly entertaining and feel very well developed to me (especially when they share screen time together in Ep VII). Similarly, Kylo's development in VIII was great imo, and even if he's not the best baddie we've had, he's certainly the most unique villain character in the Star Wars movies, which have had way too simplistically binary good/bad guys for far too long.

 

[zoogs]

I don't want to pit characters against each other too much. I can't imagine Star Wars becoming anywhere near what it did without Harrison Ford's inch-perfect Han. That man can act. And I'm a really, really big fan of Ewan McGregor's Obi-Wan. He's my favorite Jedi character, for sure. I love that moment in Ep.2 when Dooku taunts him and he replies, "I don't think so." Only his delivery makes it a moment at all. Dooku/Christopher Lee, another great one. I think he's my favorite pure Sith villain. An old-school knight with an air of princely distinction about him, yet also fully committed to the dark.

In the new ones, I just love everyone. Rey is the best protagonist, Finn shows the extraordinary in the ordinary ... and Kylo and Hux also stand out. Young people who have talents but are fighting and finding their place. The new trilogy has good characters who are well executed and worth rooting for, but it's their bad characters that kind of steal the show, IMO. The perpetrators of the greatest evil aren't ready-made lightning-throwing monsters with grotesque appearance. I love that Hux is just trying his best to advance professionally. It humanizes the villains, and equally importantly, not in a "since they're real people with real vulnerabilities, they're going to get redeemed" kind of way. These guys are definitely bad, and a reflection of what definitely bad in our world looks like, too -- i.e, not scaly and cackling, but frightened and heartless.

 

[zoogs]

Besides, Luke's brokenness and shame and guilt actually fits perfectly with his character. Think about his story. He didn't even hear about the Force until he was 19. Spends three years just doing the civil war thing with no Force training and minimal knowledge of how to interact with it. Then spent, what... a few weeks at most training with Yoda? Was only able to kind of defeat Vader by channeling his rage/emotional connection to the people he loved. 

So we're to believe that a powerfully Force-connected young adult with virtually no formal training and with deep emotional attachments is supposed to end up as a wise, stoic, classic template sort of Jedi master? Doesn't make any sense to me. What does make perfect sense to me is that while being incredibly powerful and learning a ton through teaching himself, he would have serious flaws and inconsistencies in his mastery of the Force and by extension, be susceptible to the temptations of the dark side due to his love of friends, his passion, etc.

i think where we find Luke is believable and even fits what we know about him from the OT.

Oooh, yes. I extremely dig this idea that Luke was not about to graduate into the most powerful Force user ever (though I think that is exactly where George Lucas was going, with his fixation on quantities of innate force ability. I'm sure George has some comparative midichlorian counts in his head for all his characters...)

But rather, his achievement was his personal integrity and his ability to turn Vader. Luke, by himself, with maybe some Force ghost assistance, rebuilding everything into something greater than it was before? That seemed like a longshot, and not necessarily where ROTJ was pointing to, despite the title. Alone, scared, and bearing the burdens of an impossible and soul-breaking responsibility is more like it. Luke reaches Hall of Fame Jedi status by the end of TLJ, and I think it would have been strange to see him there already.

Unless the whole story was told from a Luke-is-the-new-Yoda, now-here-comes-a-new-dark-threat perspective ... which I guess maybe is what some would've liked to see. We've talked some Tolkien recently and I feel like that's more or less his idea of a LOTR sequel, which he very quickly abandoned. After some years of awesomeness some kids start playing around at being orcs again, etc. Awesome Aragorn's awesome son is ruling now and some good guys discover and root out the evil plot. It's the kind of story that, as he put it, is "not worth doing." 

 

[Cdog923]

If Luke's character had never given up in the 30 years between Ep 6/Ep 7, there would be no story to tell in Ep 7. He would have trained a new generation of Jedi, he would have remained the constant hope of the galaxy, they would have squashed any First Order uprising and it would be Star Wars: Everything is Cool and Chill.

Besides, Luke's brokenness and shame and guilt actually fits perfectly with his character. Think about his story. He didn't even hear about the Force until he was 19. Spends three years just doing the civil war thing with no Force training and minimal knowledge of how to interact with it. Then spent, what... a few weeks at most training with Yoda? Was only able to kind of defeat Vader by channeling his rage/emotional connection to the people he loved. 

So we're to believe that a powerfully Force-connected young adult with virtually no formal training and with deep emotional attachments is supposed to end up as a wise, stoic, classic template sort of Jedi master? Doesn't make any sense to me. What does make perfect sense to me is that while being incredibly powerful and learning a ton through teaching himself, he would have serious flaws and inconsistencies in his mastery of the Force and by extension, be susceptible to the temptations of the dark side due to his love of friends, his passion, etc.

i think where we find Luke is believable and even fits what we know about him from the OT.

Like I said, we'll have to agree to disagree, under the caveat that there is still some of Luke's story to tell.