All-purpose Star Wars Skywalker Saga (1977-2019) thread

[James Fabiano]

It gets confusing that the Mandalorian thread keeps getting bumped with posts about the OT/PT/ST. I guess we can use this space instead for that?

[lucas_lee]

Fine then I'll start off with the hottest of got takes: The Last Jedis story arc of Luke Skywalker was logical and had a great ending. I preferred his journey in the movie, with the amount of things he's seen he wouldve became that disillusioned hermit

[thechase]

2019 can suck it

The saga is far from over.

[Soultastic]

Mar 1, 2021 8:34:26 GMT -5 lucas_lee said:

Fine then I'll start off with the hottest of got takes: The Last Jedis story arc of Luke Skywalker was logical and had a great ending. I preferred his journey in the movie, with the amount of things he's seen he wouldve became that disillusioned hermit

The journey itself is good. The idea that Luke "there's still good in this mass killer" Skywalker would stab his nephew to death for having naughty thoughts is character assassination. He could've gotten dissapointed in the jedi in ANY other way.

[Push R Truth]

I still think the two biggest mistakes in the New Trilogy were the weaponizing of hyperspace ramming and the massive jump from "We need massive things like Death Stars or Starkiller to blow up planets" to " OH WAIT we'll just hit that Star Destroyer with this fancy strap on and do the same thing".

Science Fiction works best when there are some seemingly arbitrary rules. Like using ships to suicide attack. They made it look so effective that every space battle looks stupid without putting a droid in a small freighter and just ramming a large battleship. "But Val, they said it was a million to one shot!" Yeah, then they showed it happening AGAIN at the end of of Rise of Skywalker above Endor. So are you now telling me there was 2 separate kabillion to one events?

The giant strap on planet killing lasers on a Star Destroyer is just a "cat out of the bag" moment. I hope it gets wiped clean and never mentioned again. It reminds be of what JJ Abbrams (surprise!) did in Star Trek with the transporting. It was made so uberpowerful that everything not involving transporting people/soldiers/warheads/bombs/supplies looks stupid.

They could have remedied the Star Destroyer issue by saying it was some sort of crazy rare tech/material/missle whatever. So at least it can be treated as a "Special weapon". But they way they are described it seems like "yeah we figured out how to miniaturize Death Star tech". Feels like we are a movie away from TIE Fighters being able to blow up Dreadnaughts with a single shot.

[xCompackx]

While both films have a few things to critique, I still think The Last Jedi and Rise of Skywalker are great films. I agree there was a weird lack of direction amongst the sequels, especially with how badly used Finn, Phasma, and Rose were, though. It's kind of like they wanted to tell all of these stories and then were like "f*** it, we've got Rey".

The Force Awakens, I'd put with any of the OT. That's a solid Star Wars film.

[Pooh Carlson]

Started a rewatch recently, including the cartoons. Took a few episodes for Clone Wars to get into a groove. Halfway through the first season and I'm enjoying it thus far.

[Mighty Attack Tribble]

Mar 1, 2021 9:15:34 GMT -5 Soultastic said:

The idea that Luke "there's still good in this mass killer" Skywalker would stab his nephew to death for having naughty thoughts is character assassination.

Luke came within moments of killing Vader too, until he came to his senses.

There's also the fact that he was sensing Palpatine through Ben, rather than Ben himself.

[Soultastic]

Mar 1, 2021 14:57:51 GMT -5 Mighty Attack Tribble said:

Mar 1, 2021 9:15:34 GMT -5 Soultastic said:

The idea that Luke "there's still good in this mass killer" Skywalker would stab his nephew to death for having naughty thoughts is character assassination.

Luke came within moments of killing Vader too, until he came to his senses.

There's also the fact that he was sensing Palpatine through Ben, rather than Ben himself.

In battle. Not IN HIS SLEEP.

[Mighty Attack Tribble]

Mar 1, 2021 15:02:14 GMT -5 Soultastic said:

Mar 1, 2021 14:57:51 GMT -5 Mighty Attack Tribble said:

Luke came within moments of killing Vader too, until he came to his senses.

There's also the fact that he was sensing Palpatine through Ben, rather than Ben himself.

In battle. Not IN HIS SLEEP.

Fair. But again, he didn't momentarily consider killing Ben because of "some naughty thoughts", he was sensing Palpatine/Snoke (basically the same person). There's no "there's still good in him" in that moment, just the living embodiment of pure evil. The Rashomon aspect of how TLJ presents the scene didn't really make that clear, but the Ben Solo comics and TROS do clarify it.

[Soultastic]

Mar 1, 2021 15:16:44 GMT -5 Mighty Attack Tribble said:

Mar 1, 2021 15:02:14 GMT -5 Soultastic said:

In battle. Not IN HIS SLEEP.

Fair. But again, he didn't momentarily consider killing Ben because of "some naughty thoughts", he was sensing Palpatine/Snoke (basically the same person). There's no "there's still good in him" in that moment, just the living embodiment of pure evil. The Rashomon aspect of how TLJ presents the scene didn't really make that clear, but the Ben Solo comics and TROS do clarify it.

Just because suplementary material tries to explain something doesn't make it less bad in the movies. The Clone Wars is an awesome show, but while it fixes a lot of problems created by the prequels, it doesn't fix them as movies.

[xCompackx]

To be fair, given how close Luke himself came to falling for Palpatine's shit in ROTJ and how he likely knew what his dad did upon joining the dark side, sensing one of his students falling for the same stuff in the same way probably would freak Luke the f*** out something fierce.

[Cyno]

Even in the context of the heat of battle, Vader taunting Luke with turning Leia during a lull (when Luke was purposely not wanting to fight him) is what sent him over the edge. He used his anger and hatred towards the Sith Lord Darth Vader and came at him with full, very un-Jedilike aggression. It resembled something similar to the dark rage a lot of darksiders used in both Canon and Legends. Only when he saw his Vader's severed, robotic hand did he come to his senses and realize that was his father. That also wasn't the first time Luke flirted with the Dark Side. I think Vader's stopping him from striking down the Emperor after he taunted him constantly about the Rebels' fate was as much about saving Luke from succumbing to the Dark Side as it was about protecting his Sith master. The latter might have been his conscious thoughts, but I'd say the former was his subconscious thought.

Luke is normally a compassionate, thoughtful individual, but he is susceptible to letting his emotions get the better with him and cause momentary lapses in judgment. It happened with his father and it happened with his nephew. That's the Anakin in him. And even the best and most accomplished Jedi in Star Wars mythos struggle against the Dark Side, with some of them outright falling. Like Count Dooku, for instance.

[Mighty Attack Tribble]

Mar 1, 2021 15:27:03 GMT -5 Soultastic said:

Mar 1, 2021 15:16:44 GMT -5 Mighty Attack Tribble said:

Fair. But again, he didn't momentarily consider killing Ben because of "some naughty thoughts", he was sensing Palpatine/Snoke (basically the same person). There's no "there's still good in him" in that moment, just the living embodiment of pure evil. The Rashomon aspect of how TLJ presents the scene didn't really make that clear, but the Ben Solo comics and TROS do clarify it.

Just because suplementary material tries to explain something doesn't make it less bad in the movies. The Clone Wars is an awesome show, but while it fixes a lot of problems created by the prequels, it doesn't fix them as movies.

TROS is a movie, not suplementary material, and Palpatine's "it was me from the very beginning" speech gives you the context for that scene that neither Luke or Ben had when recounting their versions of events. IIRC the more on the nose explanation from the comics was in the unused Trevorrow script, since he and Johnson did collaborate on bridging their movies.

[YAKMAN is ICHIBAN]

I think the sequel trilogy films are as close as you can get to "objectively bad" in a movie without getting into low-budget B movies that are crap on a technical level, this side of the Michael Bay Transformers films.

And as bad as The Force Awakens and The Last Jedi were, The Rise of Skywalker surpassed even my wildest of low expectations.

I'm 100% on board with de-canonizing them, or cannonizing them, out of a cannon into the sun. I have nothing nice to say about them, and the concept of finding them not only redeemable but enjoyable is so unfathomable to me I simple cannot wrap my head around it.

The prequels suck too, albeit differently.

The Mandalorian has single-handedly re-energized my fandom, and actually got me to check out The Clone Wars which I never watched before.

[YAKMAN is ICHIBAN]

Mar 1, 2021 15:45:32 GMT -5 Mighty Attack Tribble said:

Mar 1, 2021 15:27:03 GMT -5 Soultastic said:

Just because suplementary material tries to explain something doesn't make it less bad in the movies. The Clone Wars is an awesome show, but while it fixes a lot of problems created by the prequels, it doesn't fix them as movies.

TROS is a movie, not suplementary material, and Palpatine's "it was me from the very beginning" speech gives you the context for that scene that neither Luke or Ben had when recounting their versions of events. IIRC the more on the nose explanation from the comics was in the unused Trevorrow script, since he and Johnson did collaborate on bridging their movies.

Incidentally I doubt Rian Johnson had that context either when he wrote and directed the scene, since it played like a giant retcon ass-pull in TROS.

[Mighty Attack Tribble]

Mar 1, 2021 15:50:47 GMT -5 YAKMAN is ICHIBAN said:

Mar 1, 2021 15:45:32 GMT -5 Mighty Attack Tribble said:

TROS is a movie, not suplementary material, and Palpatine's "it was me from the very beginning" speech gives you the context for that scene that neither Luke or Ben had when recounting their versions of events. IIRC the more on the nose explanation from the comics was in the unused Trevorrow script, since he and Johnson did collaborate on bridging their movies.

Incidentally I doubt Rian Johnson had that context either when he wrote and directed the scene, since it played like a giant retcon ass-pull in TROS.

The Johnson-Trevorrow version had Luke sensing Snoke, and unless either state otherwise that was the context all along. Abrams merely retconned it to being Palpatine.

[Deleted]

lol.... I posted something in the Mandalorian earlier today and then thought "I wonder if there might be another all purpose SW thread, because my post had nothing to do with this show at all."

I willed this thread into existence.

I made Snoke this thread, my boy.

Mar 1, 2021 15:45:32 GMT -5 Mighty Attack Tribble said:

Mar 1, 2021 15:27:03 GMT -5 Soultastic said:

Just because suplementary material tries to explain something doesn't make it less bad in the movies. The Clone Wars is an awesome show, but while it fixes a lot of problems created by the prequels, it doesn't fix them as movies.

TROS is a movie, not suplementary material, and Palpatine's "it was me from the very beginning" speech gives you the context for that scene that neither Luke or Ben had when recounting their versions of events. IIRC the more on the nose explanation from the comics was in the unused Trevorrow script, since he and Johnson did collaborate on bridging their movies.

See, now I'd heard that a reason Trevorrow was fired was that he was working on his movie connecting more to TFA than to TLJ, while Disney was (apparently) somewhat hoping that each movie would just built off its immediate predecessor and not bridge the whole series together...

(really wishes I didn't know Trevorrow's TROS would have utilized the somewhat-abandoned Corsucant as the First Order's homebase, because I'd have loved that so much.)

[Mighty Attack Tribble]

Mar 1, 2021 16:16:19 GMT -5 @knapp said:

See, now I'd heard that a reason Trevorrow was fired was that he was working on his movie connecting more to TFA than to TLJ, while Disney was (apparently) somewhat hoping that each movie would just built off its immediate predecessor and not bridge the whole series together...

(really wishes I didn't know Trevorrow's TROS would have utilized the somewhat-abandoned Corsucant as the First Order's homebase, because I'd have loved that so much.)

Quite the opposite. Kathleen Kennedy herself said that Trevorrow was essentially let go because he was too disconnected from TFA:

“Colin was at a huge disadvantage not having been a part of Force Awakens and in part of those early conversations because we had a general sense of where the story was going. Like any development process, it was only in the development that we’re looking at a first draft and realising that it was perhaps heading in a direction that many of us didn’t feel was really quite where we wanted it to go. We were on a schedule, as we often are with these movies, and had to make a tough decision as to whether or not we thought we could get there in the time or not. And as I said, Colin was at a disadvantage because he hadn’t been immersed in everything that we all had starting out with Episode VII.”

Translation: "Holy shit, TLJ is getting slammed by half our fanbase and Colin's building directly from that."

What we do know about the sequels' development is this:

Abrams set it up with Rey being a Palpatine; Palpatine was the puppet master all along, with Snoke either being a Palpatine clone or his Dooku-like apprentice (sources vary).

Johnson thought that was a dumb retread of huge chunks of the other two trilogies and wanted Kylo Ren to be the big bad, albeit a tortured one who has some good in him but is ultimately too far gone.

Trevorrow brainstormed with Johnson to build on his ideas, leading to his ultimately unused story:

SPOILER: Click to show

{Spoiler}{Spoiler}

The iron grip of the FIRST ORDER has spread to the farthest reaches of the galaxy. Only a few scattered planets remain unoccupied. Traitorous acts are punishable by death. Determined to suffocate a growing unrest, Supreme Leader KYLO REN has silenced all communication between neighboring systems. Led by GENERAL LEIA ORGANA, the Resistance has planned a secret mission to prevent their annihilation and forge a path to freedom…

The beginning of the film very much picks up from The Last Jedi in that the First Order has cut off all communication between planets in order to suppress a rebellion inspired by Luke Skywalker’s stand off at the Battle of Crait. So the spark of the rebellion did work in this version of the movie. In fact, the opening sequence of Duel of the Fates finds Finn (John Boyega), Rose (Kelly Marie Tran), and BB-8 stealing a Star Destroyer that’s chock full of Imperial weapons. During the heist, Finn sees a Stormtrooper with his helmet off that he recognizes, with his story arc in Duel of the Fates nicely concluding the one that began in The Force Awakens. Oh and Rose? Apparently front and center through the whole movie, which is a damn shame given that she’s completely sidelined in Rise of Skywalker.

In Trevorrow’s version, Rose and Finn are on a mission to Coruscant to ignite an ancient beacon in the old Jedi Temple, which will call the galaxy to war. They get imprisoned, Rose gets interrogated by General Hux (Domhnall Gleeson), and Finn leads an uprising of defecting Stormtroopers in a ground battle in the streets of Coruscant. At the very end of the movie, Finn and Rose lead a group of Force Sensitive youth to a remote planet where Rey is waiting to train the next generation of Jedi. And yes, “Broom Boy” is one of them.

As for Reylo, well, Kylo Ren still dies at the end of Duel of the Fates, but his arc in the film—as well as Rey’s—is completely different. For one, there’s no Emperor Palpatine. At the beginning of the movie, Kylo Ren has vanished off to Mustafar (Darth Vader’s lava planet) and is wallowing around in Vader’s old castle. There, he’s “haunted” by the Force Ghost of Luke Sykwalker (Mark Hamill’s return) and even fights a hallucinatory version of Darth Vader a la Luke's fight in the cave. He comes into contact with the Sith teacher of Palpatine, Tor Valum, via an ancient Sith device as he’s trying to put an end to the Jedi and the Sith once and for all. But he’s bad, bad, bad in this version of the story—he’s gone full Heisenberg, so to speak.

Rey (Daisy Ridley), meanwhile, still believes there’s good in Kylo Ren and has teamed up with Poe (Oscar Isaac) to put an end to the Jedi/Sith in her own way—another story point this film picks up from the ending of The Last Jedi.

And Rey’s parents? Still nobodies (i.e. Rey is not a Palpatine), but Kylo Ren killed them at the behest of Snoke. Ouch. The finale of the movie finds Rey and Kylo Ren duking it out on the mystical planet Mortis, with Rey getting an assist from the Force Ghosts of Luke, Obi-Wan (Ewan McGregor, presumably), and Yoda. The Jedi try unsuccessfully to bring Kylo Ren back to the light, but he's too far gone and in the end he is “extinguished.”

collider.com/star-wars-9-colin-trevorrow-script-leak-plot-details/

LucasFilm panicked over the mixed fan reception to Last Jedi, so we wound up with J.J.'s Reddit movie, which pleased nobody.

The argument can definitely be made that Trevorrow's movie would've still been shit, because he's just not a particularly good director, but it would've at least been more interesting and much more consistent with the movies which came before it.

[BorneAgain]

This is not entirely related to the current debate, but online reviewer SFDebris has a great series of videos on the history of how Star Wars got made, starting with a New Hope:

The Hero's Journey

as well as Empire strikes Back and Return of the Jedi

The Shadow's Journey

While it punctures a lot of the myths Lucas himself has propagated about the creation of the original trilogy, I think both documentary series actually are quite flattering towards his story ideas and gives logical reasoning towards why he made the decisions he did. The latter also details the sad end to his marriage as well, something I suspect ended up informing a lot of his character elements about Anakin in the prequels.

While that series on the prequel films is being gradually posted and is unfinished at the moment, the former two are definitely worth a look, and those curious about even more details should check out the Secret History of Star Wars book which dives completely into the subject.