This is not going to go the way you think!
Luke Skywalker, The Last Jedi
(
Nota bene: There are some spoilers in this posting. Some
people might consider them to be large spoilers, but from a certain
point of view*, they're actually quite small. Regardless, they
are spoilers.)
So, at last**, my comments on
The Last Jedi.
It was okay.
For a
Star Wars
movie, that's an epic condemnation. This is one of the longest running and certainly the most profitable franchises in the history of franchises - in fact, you
can almost consider it to BE the history of franchises - and as such,
the expectation is that it will entertain, astonish, and touch the audience.
Which it does, from time to time. Sadly, it also confused and irritated, which is not a good combination for any movie.
To
be fair, there were parts of this movie that I loved. It's full of excellent performances and great bits of sly humour, much of which comes from Luke Skywalker.
I was
unexpectedly touched to see Luke return to the story. It’s
been 34 years since Mark Hamill last played this part, and I was pleasantly
surprised to see how much of the naïve farm boy from Tatooine remained
in his performance, and disappointed to discover that he's unlikely to appear
in the next film. It would have been gratifying to see Luke's character develop based on his experience in this episode, perhaps finally fulfilling his destiny and bringing balance to the Force.
In his absence, there are other candidates for the role of redeemer. The Force-powered long-distance relationship between Kylo Ren and Rey was brilliant, and the chemistry
that builds between the two characters bodes well for the conclusion to
the trilogy. Kylo Ren is one of the better parts of the movie: the
character showed unexpected depth, and in some ways I'm finding his
story to be more interesting than Rey's. And, yes, the question of Rey's background is answered, in a fashion that perfectly matches the theme of this movie and sets the character free.
In
fact, that's the most unexpected thing that this film does: it
deliberately cuts ties to the past. As characters from the other
movies become fewer and fewer***, we are presented with a story that, as
Luke says, will not go the way that we think.
However, the good parts of
The Last Jedi are strongly overshadowed by the flaws, large and small.
The
plot has a terrible Rosebud**** error, where a character has knowledge
that he is explicitly unable to have based on the timeline of the film, and a pointless subplot regarding an authority struggle in the
Resistance that seems to take place only for the purposes of conflict
between characters. People have done their best to explain these problems, but really, if your plot points need defending after the event, something has gone a bit wrong with your story.
Similarly, the Canto Bight sequence has been strenuously debated after the fact. I appreciated the points being made in the segment, but let's be honest, it did nothing to advance the plot -
if anything, it took up time that could have been better spent
elsewhere, perhaps with Luke and Rey.
There are also a lot of little problems, things that don't quite work: Maz Kanata's odd cameo (who IS holding the camera for that?); the sudden discovery that light speed vehicles can be a weapon, Phasma's wasted potential as a character; Snoke's back story; people flipping over between shots; and a score of other flaws and missed opportunities.
And, last and
least, the blatant children's-toy-marketability of the porgs was almost
insulting. Ewoks were bad enough, Jar Jar Binks is legendary for the
negative fan response that he received, but porgs were such obvious
product placement that they might as well have been drinking Coke™.
Large and important things happen in
The Last Jedi,
and it beautifully sets up the question of what will happen next. And
it's already made well over a billion dollars - $1.27 billion at the time
I'm typing this, a huge success by any standard. I just wish that I'd liked it more.
- Sid
* Did everyone see what I did there? If not, Google away, it's an Obi-Wan Kenobi joke.
**
https://theinfiniterevolution.blogspot.ca/2016/03/is-it-okay-to-call-you-bill.html
*** With that in mind, I
was surprised that they didn't take advantage of a clear opportunity to remove Leia from the story. Shooting for
The Last Jedi had
finished several months before Carrie Fisher's death at the end of
2016, but post-production on the film didn't finish until September of
this year. That would have given them lots of time to do a minor rewrite, one that would have actually made a lot of sense, building on the events of
The Force Awakens to further establish Kylo's
desire to turn his back on the past and be his own person. It's
admirable that instead of taking the easy way out, the producers decided
to leave Ms. Fisher's last performance untouched.
**** In case you're not a movie scholar, in the film
Citizen Kane,
a reporter spends the entire film trying to determine the significance
of Kane's final word: "Rosebud". Unfortunately, he dies alone, and as
such, no one would know what he said. Various people have tried to
explain this in various ways over the years - and various people are
trying to explain the flaw in
The Last Jedi in a similar fashion.
