Messages

I think maybe we were all watching different films. So....

A new hope - luke aspires to join the rebellion to fight the evil empire. Risks his life to save a princess, then risks it again to destroy the death star. He's a bit stroppy because he's young and bored.

Empire - luke fights the evil empire on hoth, trains to be a jedi, but must leave to save his friends....risks his life for them......chooses potential death rather than join his evil father.

Jedi - luke risks his life to save his friend from Jabba, tells yoda he can't murder his father, tells his sister he can save their father, risks his life to do so, chooses almost certain death rather than join the emperor.

Last jedi - luke has trained some young aspiring jedi.....has a sense of something bad in his nephew....decides to go and kill him in his sleep. Abandons all of his friends and hides from the baddies.

We know of no terrible trauma that he's had over the decades that should somehow push luke to this incredible about face on all of his beliefs and convictions......he's just a bit of a coward and a weasle now because he's older.....and he had a dodgy feeling about something that hadn't happened.....despite him knowing jedi visions are entirely unreliable.

Seriously? Help me out with where that was plausible character progression. He's fundamentally changed his entire belief system and motivations for absolutely no good reason. Why has he lost everything that made him Luke?.

The one criticism I keep seeing about TLJ that I really don't get is this notion that they got Luke's character wrong, or that he was a different person than he was in the original trilogy.

Just don't see it at all, he was always conflicted, prone to grumpiness and self doubt and even when he was projecting himself as some badass jedi warrior he could come out of it looking arrogant and flawed. I thought TLJ nailed that guy further down the line and later in life.

I think he couldn't be a more different character.

You think that the Luke Skywalker who would lay down his life rather than turn to evil, and is eternally optimistic, to the point of his own potential destruction, that there is a spark of good in a man who has done the terrible things that his father has done would turn into a man that would murder a young, defenceless, confused member of his own family in his sleep because he sensed a flicker of bad in him? A person that had, at that time, done nothing?

A guy who would rush headlong into mortal peril to help his friends, would completely abandon them?

I'm struggling with that one. Our interpretations of that character are clearly a hundred miles apart.

Anyone still waiting on this prog to arrive? Mine is MIA.

I think the progressive case for more diversity is predicated on the notion that audiences wish/deserve to be personally represented, in which case males have as much right to a representative role model as females.

In which case, look at, I dunno, about 99% of media. As someone bringing up a girl, I'm sick and tired of the notion that films should have X character as a role model. Across film, we should get a range. So if you watch 50 films, you'd see men, women, boys, girls, straight, gay, white, PoC. But what we really get is OH MY GOD THERE'S A GIRL, WHY ARE THERE NO MENZ

And I know that wasn't what you were saying, Professor Bear, but I really wish media as a whole would be a bit more thoughtful. The reality is: people argue girls will read about/watch boys, but not the reverse. The white male becomes the default. Everyone else has to pick up the scraps. Frankly, whatever else I think about the new Star Wars, I was really fucking happy that the hero was a woman, and that the co-hero was black. It's not like the film's not full of white blokes elsewhere anyway – it's just they're (for once) not the leads.

I really liked Rey in the Force Awakens. I thought all of the new cast were great. So much so in fact that I really wish the old cast weren't there to get in the way and cause problems.

I take no issue with Rey and Finn being front and centre in the whole trilogy.......what irritated me was the constant having to make men look stupid to elevate the female leads. That's not equality is it?  Finn is made to look inferior and stupid, Po gets the same treatment (and later finally learns how to run away) and Luke comes out of it worst of all. I'm assuming that was no accident. All men = lacklustre in that film. Kylo ultimately fails, but at the hands of cowardly Luke on his island.....where he seemingly hides while leaving his sister and family in constant mortal peril .....because that's what Luke is like......apparently.

Damn....thought I was finished ranting about this goddam stupid film.

The Last Jedi fundamentally misunderstands a characters core being, I get that we can become jaded, disillusioned and bitter with age....but this took a giant step into the ridiculous in its about turn with that character choice. It just does not work (in my opinion). What's more, other than sensing darkness in his own nephew, Luke really didn't have any terrible experiences to corrupt his beliefs so drastically.

If they'd have just got Lukes character right, if he came across as a maturing of the same man that we saw in Return of the Jedi, I could have forgiven the film it's awful Finn, Rose, Po and Holdo story arcs and the constant rug pulling.

Right, enough of my anti last jedi propaganda......I've said it all before. It's just not for me.

Yeah, I follow all this guys, but I have to admit, as a 5 year old boy watching Star Wars i really wanted to be Luke, and a little later still I wanted to be Han (now I want to be luke again.....but the one from Return of the Jedi, not that new guy). At no point did I want to be Princess Leia, despite the fact that (in the original trilogy) she was fantastic.

I think it's okay for a little boy to have positive male role models that they want to emulate. That's not denigrating the female role models in the film in any way by saying that.

As for the men in Last jedi, we are arguing that they learned something and improved......maybe......but they are all shown to be inferior people to begin with, and they don't really come across very well for 99% of the fil. Most of them are shown to be fairly stupid and sub-standard for the majority of the film. The.man who would rather die than turn to the dark side, who would sacrifice his life in the solid belief that there was just a shred of decency in his genocidal child murderer father considers.murdering his own nephew because he thought he was a little off kilter. Sigh.

My general opinions haven't changed, I thought Force Awakens was a very safe and promising start, but I didn't like the token death in it. Last Jedi was not my thing at all, with a flurry of bad decisions that not only ruined that film, but has retrospectively robbed Force Awakens of some of its strongest story elements. The attempts at humour in Last Jedi fall entirely flat and feel out of place.

I do not find common ground with any of the extreme voices on you tube beyond my dislike of episode 8. I don't care who runs lucasfilm, I don't care about the gender, sexuality, race or religion of my heroes.....I just want an exciting action adventure film with positive aspirational role models for both of my children* (girl and a boy), hope, and good triumphing over evil. And please aim the films at all ages......I'm increasingly bemused by who each film is for. Last Jedi certainly played at a lot younger audience that the Clone wars cartoon.

On a positive note......it took me until the age of 45 to get bored about talking Star Wars. I think I just need to accept that it's an entirely different beast now and it seems is just not "my thing".

*can anyone point at the positive male role model in Last jedi?

I similarly share a lot of that apathy now......the Internet seems intent on killing the joy in most things. And yes, I do appreciate the irony that I too am a part of that by discussing this here.

As for Kennedy, nobody will ever convince me that giving a film so important to get right as "The Last Jedi" to Rian Johnson, seemingly leaving him with free reign to do whatever he liked, with a constant background nagging murmur from its main star, was  ever a good decision. It feels like someone who just couldn't care less about the quality of the output.

And I don't agree with the opinion that star wars fans are a toxic bunch, I don't think that could be further from the truth. There's just a bunch of unpleasant vocal extreme fans who are making a lot of noise....they are a part of every fan following, including this one.

I'm not buying that it's all just Internet hatred directed at Kathleen Kennedy.  From my point of view she has shown an apathy towards star wars, produced inferior "product", dealt with the audience poorly, had some very turbulent productions, taken director replacement and re-shooting to impressive levels, and has seen the sales of Star wars merchandising fall. It's not just the films, star wars related income has fallen.

I won't miss her, I know some of you have enjoyed what Lucasfilm have done since Lucas departure, but on the whole for me it's been mostly disappointing or just plain awful.

More than happy for anyone else to take over, regardless of age, sexuality, gender, race or religion.....just as long as they are actually at least interested in Star wars.

Between the Kennedy and Gunn situations you do have to wonder where it will all end when the vilest shits on the internet seem to influence billion-dollar decisions. Imagine a world where Shapiro and Cernovitch (a man who probably belongs on a D Wing somewhere) are kingmakers of pop culture.

Internet ranters aside, I think it's fair to say that most people would fear for their job if they lost as much money for the shareholders as Kathleen Kennedy has this last 12 months.

It generally played to the family audience, some of it was bad, mostly it was great.

I'm not aiming to be pithy, sarcastic or argumentative, it was just a generally solid piece of entertainment. Rebels was more of a children aimed show with lower production values.

It had genuinely great episodes, and some really poor episodes.  Bit when it was good, it was good.

"The clone wars" cartoon is easily the best star wars outside of the original trilogy, so this is great news. I guess this will be the last ever chunk of Lucas-involved Star wars too.

I preferred Rebels, but that did build on a lot of stuff set up by Clone Wars.

I really don't like rebels, its dull, turgid and just plain boring in comparison to what clone wars offered.....and the production quality is way worse. It also plays to a much younger audience, its actively aimed at children where I don't feel clone wars ever was. Despite the promise of McDairmid emperor I still can't bring myself to get through the last season that I've had sitting there for months.

"The clone wars" cartoon is easily the best star wars outside of the original trilogy, so this is great news. I guess this will be the last ever chunk of Lucas-involved Star wars too.

.....but it makes me think about that incredibly lacklustre finale.

Wall-e was a great film, possibly even Michael Crawford's best.....after Condor man of course.

I couldn't work out what that sentence meant - never realised it was Michael Crawford in the archie footage!

Yeah.....possibly was a slightly obscure reference on reflection!