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The Last Jedi - Actually Widely Hated?

There were many times when OT characters talked about the past, but the dialogue had to carry the exposition alone. That's how it should be done. So on a purely stylistic basis alone, the flashback was a FAIL.

I'm sorry, I'm not of the mind that because a film hadn't used a tool before that it is forever forbidden from using the tool.
 
Luke’s failure works unlike Obi-Wan’s because we’re just told it happened

OT Obi-Wan, certainly by the end of Empire, really wasn't meant to be particularly admirable or likeable and I think many fans never did particularly like him after it. I believe Obi-Wan's defense "What I told you was true, from a certain point of view" is widely regarded, both pre- and post-prequels, as a big cop-out by both the character and filmmakers.

It's funny. When the books did it it's fine. The movies do it not fine...:shrug:

The son of Leia & Han, formerly one of the heroes, going bad, becoming monstrous, basically just because the writers wanted to do something like the PT, have a lot of angst and show the OT big three as failures was bad in the books.
 
RJ got the job because it's so far up her ass.. and he writes "strong female characters"

We all have things that we think would be better if we did them "our way" (I'm pretty strongly opposed to choices made on Star Trek: Discovery), but that is an opinion. For whatever reason, we didn't earn the right to sit in the chairs that steer our favorite franchises. And being fans doesn't give us the right to be abusive to folks sitting in those chairs.
 
OT Obi-Wan, certainly by the end of Empire, really wasn't meant to be particularly admirable or likeable

Not by design. Obi-Wan was used as a way to absorb a retcon on the part of Lucas. Also, Obi-Wan was never a main character in the OT. It was OK for him to have been a failed teacher. It's hard to take a protagonist and shift him to a side-character when mentally you are still thinking of him as a protagonist.

Think of the way Han was used in Force awakens. The character wasn't made unlikeable, but they made him regress back to where he was in A New Hope outside of now being a believer in the force.

Leia's character just stagnated. She never became a Jedi (which is why in theory I liked that she used a force power in Last Jedi). Lucas' original treatment for the sequel trilogy would have had Leia train to be a Jedi. So those thinking that somehow things followed Lucas' template are way off base. Some similarities, yes, but not that many.
 
Is Disney soliciting suggestions? ;) Retcon the prequels, TFA and TLJ, recast Luke, Han, and Leia, and pick up where ROTJ left off? Personally I think Star Wars is big enough to support new characters. If well conceived, they can be just as memorable as the original characters. Leave the original characters in the original trilogy.


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What did I want? I wanted a Star Wars film, you know.. heroes, villains. etc. The characters in star Wars are simplistic, iconic and archetypal.. they have been for 40 years.. they are not shallow.. but also not to deep.. the original trilogy the writers peppered in the development over time, sprinkling it in.. but this movie feels that a 30 year time jump alone is reason enough to completely upend what these characters were about. Imagine Steve Rodgers, now a hero to many young film goings, and years form now we see him drinking titty milk and not caring, .. yeah that would suck. The film "explains" why Luke is like this .. but in my opinion it doesn't "convince" us that he would do be like this, let alone the fact that by the time we get to the "explanation" 2/3 into the film (which is already a tonal mess) we already determined that he is rude and unlikeable. "Oh it's more realistic that he would be this way.." screw that.. stories.. and cinematic storytelling, isn't always about realism..I think one of the best tools a storyteller has is familiarity .. working off that.

One thing they could have done was have Luke pass on as a hero, always selfless, enerv leaving his friends and family.. and then the future SW movies could have the heroic characters using him as a measuring rod, can anyone live up to him and what he did.. that he was not just a good Jedi, but that he was able to see beyond their dogmatic views and see the importance of family? That way they don't screw up a legacy character. I don't know that's just me. And you can still have your angst and cynicism audiences today love so much. I personally think that the genius of the original trilogy was the simplicity, the straightforward storytelling.. that might not suit every kind of story, but it suited SW very well .. and in the process people walked out of those films with big smiles.. they were eager to collect some of the incredible toys

The key point to consider is....thirty years.

What were you doing thirty years ago?
 
First of all, Star Wars has a very formal style to it. Everything down to the use of old-timey wipes. It's something that really needs to be maintained in order to feel authentic. The use of a visual flashback of any kind violated that filmic language (as did the timelapse shot of seedlings coming from the ground).

I now hear there will be several flashbacks in Episode IX as well so they are pretty far off the rails now.

There were many times when OT characters talked about the past, but the dialogue had to carry the exposition alone. That's how it should be done. So on a purely stylistic basis alone, the flashback was a FAIL.

What do you mean by "formal style" here?
 
Thirty years.. isn't enough to just sharply change a character like Luke in this way.. especially not one that actually is more of an archetype thana a character.. a classical hero,, the kind of character kids at make-a-wish look up to.. they should be more careful with how they handle a character like that
Sure I'm not the same as I was thirty years ago, but ultimately realism isn't why I turn to an escapist fantasy likeSw,.. the 30 year time jump is a lot of horse shit
The movie isn't out yet, but the Maverick trailer has a 30 year time jump as well, and one of the fascinating things is how the trailer sells this time jump, how you believe that Maverick is the kind of character that would basically be the same. It seems to respect the fact that the original movie was not some treatise on human nature.. it was a cheesy formula film.. and SW, as much as we love it, is a somewhat cheesy space adventure, very pulpy in style, with the mythological underpinnings
 
The movie isn't out yet, but the Maverick trailer has a 30 year time jump as well, and one of the fascinating things is how the trailer sells this time jump, how you believe that Maverick is the kind of character that would basically be the same. It seems to respect the fact that the original movie was not some treatise on human nature.. it was a cheesy formula film.. and SW, as much as we love it, is a somewhat cheesy space adventure, very pulpy in style, with the mythological underpinnings

I lol'd when I saw the Maverick trailer. He's STILL a fucking pilot. It stretches credulity to the point it shatters reality. There's no fucking way he would still be a pilot. The only reason he's still a pilot is so there can be action sequences involving the character. Oh, he shoulda been an admiral says Ed Harris... But Maverick is such a Maverick he has turned down every promotion.

Whatever.

It makes Maverick downright ridiculous. It looks like a terrible male fantasy of an aging movie star.
 
We don't know yet how Maverick turned out, just trailers. Cobra Kai is an example of handling characters with a large time-gap well, although that particular approach wouldn't have worked for SW.
 

Wait. What? Hold up, hold up. Seriously? It's ... not REAL. We aren't watching a real person? Oh, MAN, I wish someone had told me that earlier. Wow. My mind is BAH-LOWN.

People aren't going to go to a Top Gun movie to see the snot nosed punks. Look at the way the TOS movies contrived to get Kirk back out hopping galaxies and didn't let the bridge crew leave until Trek VI when Sulu got the Excelsior.

Of course people aren't going to see a Top Gun movie to see a brand new cast. It was a movie based around Tom Cruise being Tom Cruise. While it certainly is a stylized movie, it's still clearly set in more or less the real world.

And, yeah, look at how the TOS movies got Admiral Kirk... oh... yeah...

(Of course, let's not point out the difference between the guy who is commanding a ship and a guy who takes orders to fly a fighter jet. A better comparison would be if Wedge was still an X-wing pilot 30 years later... Sad, sad. But, he's a MAVERICK, YA'LL!!!)

But, to the larger point, the problem is back to the audience, they don't want to see anything different. They want to see the same thing with the illusion that it's different.
 
Wait. What? Hold up, hold up. Seriously? It's ... not REAL. We aren't watching a real person? Oh, MAN, I wish someone had told me that earlier. Wow. My mind is BAH-LOWN.

Is it possible for you to contribute to this thread without being rude and obnoxious?

A better comparison would be if Wedge was still an X-wing pilot 30 years later... Sad, sad. But, he's a MAVERICK, YA'LL!!!)

Well, Han was a smuggler again in Force Awakens and the movie made 2 billion. Kinda hurts your paradigm of this "unrealistic" aspect being a showstopper for the public, dunnit? I thought it was kinda regressive, sure, but crowd-pleasing.

But, to the larger point, the problem is back to the audience, they don't want to see anything different. They want to see the same thing with the illusion that it's different.

Yeah, so? The public wants what the public wants. Shake your fist at them as you wish.

The Maverick trailer has 284K likes to only 12K dislikes. I'd say they struck the right chord.

I'd say you've got an uphill battle to convince people to reject Maverick based on the premise.
 
Is it possible for you to contribute to this thread without being rude and obnoxious?

Then stop pointing out the obvious. Of course it's a movie.

Well, Han was a smuggler again in Force Awakens and the movie made 2 billion. Kinda hurts your paradigm of this "unrealistic" aspect being a showstopper for the public, dunnit? I thought it was kinda regressive, sure, but crowd-pleasing.

1. It's a movie in a galaxy far far away.
2. I never said it was a showstopper. I said I wasn't interested. I'm sure Maverick will makes lots of money.
3. And it agrees with my point, people want to see the same thing with the illusion of difference.
4. Ford was right, Solo shoulda died in ROTJ.

Yeah, so? The public wants what the public wants. Shake your fist at them as you wish.

Lol. I'm not really. I'm more rolling my eyes at them. Especially when the public--like here--Why can't we get something original.

The Maverick trailer has 284K likes to only 12K dislikes. I'd say they struck the right chord.

*looks to see where I claimed it wouldn't succeed or be popular, can't find it.*
*shrugs*

I'd say you've got an uphill battle to convince people to reject Maverick based on the premise.

I didn't realize I was trying to convince people to reject Maverick. I thought I was rejecting Maverick. But, you're right, it's going to be an uphill battle convincing me to not get in the car and go see the --- Oh, look at that. I did it! I convinced myself to reject Maverick! I saved myself time and money! Woo hoo!

Miracles CAN happen here, ya'll!
 
I didn't realize I was trying to convince people to reject Maverick. I thought I was rejecting Maverick. But, you're right, it's going to be an uphill battle convincing me to not get in the car and go see the --- Oh, look at that. I did it! I convinced myself to reject Maverick! I saved myself time and money! Woo hoo!

You know what convinced me to reject Maverick? The trailer.
 
Wrath of Khan handled aging very well.. though there was a time jump from the series, the character got older, but he didn't go psycho on us. We buy it as the same character. Of course the problem is that if you think about it, ever since Wrath of Khan most of the Trek films became about aging. I mean really..it got so bogged down in it.. just because it worked for Wrath of Khan and maybe the follwoing two films.. even the TNG films were all about aging.. and whatever inspired TOS was gone from the films.. and I feel that whatever inspired SW to begin with is all gone now .. it's dried up sorry huck of its former self. .. uninteresting and not entertaining
 
I didn't realize I was trying to convince people to reject Maverick. I thought I was rejecting Maverick.

If that's fair, then along those lines leave those who reject The Last Jedi alone. Fair 'nuff?

Didn't think so.

Topic of this thread is whether or not The Last Jedi is widely hated. The answer is, it is. That doesn't invalidate that you like it. Enjoy being in the minority.
 
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