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 ZebioLizard2 wrote:
It was also mentioned that he was crueler and far more powerful then Darth Vader, which did help hype him up given Darth Vader had his infamous constant force chokes for failure.

Emperor? No, not originally, in ANH he was just mentioned in passing. In second movie they build him up and he showed up briefly, and in retrospect it is really textbook way to present major villain. When Emperor finally arrives in person it is presented as a big deal and it IS a big deal. However his origin still isn't mentioned anywhere. It is no longer relevant subject for the characters to discuss.

Now, if in Ep.2 Darth Tyranus had suddenly killed off Sideous after his character had been hyped up as a mystery villain, that would have been more in line what people are complaining about now - but nothing like that was done with Snoke. Characters in the movie didn't care about his 'mystery background', so I didn't care either. Sure, they COULD have build up Snoke into great villain by exploring his background and goals and abilities, but they chose to use his character for another purpose and I am fine with that.

 ZebioLizard2 wrote:

Also no it wasn't just the fanbase given that they teased a lot of things over time when it came to the character of Snoke through interviews and other such things, and the new director apparently decided "Nah" and enjoyed trolling fans who liked such a direction on his twitter.

I don't watch interviews or extras or any of that stuff, so I have been entirely ignorant about it, and good for me. Movie should stand on its own without the viewer meta or Extended Universe knowledge. Such things are just bonuses for the more rabid fans and you should never base the storybuilding around them. That's one thing which went wrong in prequels and TFA, too much meta and fan service creeping inside the movies. Hey, Anakin built C3PO! Boba Fett's dad was source for the Clones! Chewbacca used to fight alongside Yoda! Finn and Rey stumble upon Millenium Falcon! Yawn. I say we give a medal for Rian Johnson for successful trolling around this idiocy.

I wonder if the Third film might answer Snokes history. If we consider that the remains of the Rebellion can fit onto the Falcon and lost most of their upper ranks and lower ranks at the same time then it might be that the Rebels can't win by a major military feat again.


So we might well see Rey or others go on a quest to find out more about Snoke; how he came to power so fast; how he equipped and armed the First Order - ergo the history of the Order beyond it being remnant of the Imperial Fleet (as its very clear the First Order is more than just remains).

With the hope that if they find out about Snokes history it might lead them to how to defeat the First Order. Also it was hinted in this last film that not all the other Jedi in training were killed; Snoke might well have had a favourite, but he might have trained others as well

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

Sorry to bring this up again, but it's interesting to actually watch through some interviews from that same string of interviews. If you search youtube you can find a few videos where Mark is being interviewed by various web folks while wearing the same clothes with the same background, it seems they set up just to do a bunch of quick interviews one after the other. Mark actually looks like he's getting a bit sick of interviews during this particular set of them

If you watch a few of them I still don't get the impression Mark liked how he had to portray Luke, at best I think he recognised that Luke shouldn't be playing a large part because it's about the new kids. Even in Mark's twitter post he says he regrets voicing his concerns, but didn't actually state anything contrary to his previously stated opinions about Luke.

I think Mark still wasn't happy about Luke's portrayal but just accepts the movie wasn't about him*** and regrets giving haters something to point to when they're complaining about the film.

While I am not 100% happy with treatment of Luke in the movie myself, is this really subject we need to dwell on any longer? Do people remember anymore that Alec Guinness hated the part of Obi-Wan and thought his dialogue was awful and childish and TBH, it shows in his performance. He only took the part because of huge wads of cash he made from it.

Backfire wrote:

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

Sorry to bring this up again, but it's interesting to actually watch through some interviews from that same string of interviews. If you search youtube you can find a few videos where Mark is being interviewed by various web folks while wearing the same clothes with the same background, it seems they set up just to do a bunch of quick interviews one after the other. Mark actually looks like he's getting a bit sick of interviews during this particular set of them

If you watch a few of them I still don't get the impression Mark liked how he had to portray Luke, at best I think he recognised that Luke shouldn't be playing a large part because it's about the new kids. Even in Mark's twitter post he says he regrets voicing his concerns, but didn't actually state anything contrary to his previously stated opinions about Luke.

I think Mark still wasn't happy about Luke's portrayal but just accepts the movie wasn't about him*** and regrets giving haters something to point to when they're complaining about the film.

While I am not 100% happy with treatment of Luke in the movie myself, is this really subject we need to dwell on any longer? Do people remember anymore that Alec Guinness hated the part of Obi-Wan and thought his dialogue was awful and childish and TBH, it shows in his performance. He only took the part because of huge wads of cash he made from it.

Given that to him at the time it was a one time role in something he didn't expect to do amazingly. And on the other hand you have someone who constantly comes back for cameo's, loved discussing it with fans, and in general has practically embraced the role. Mark is very well known that if he embraces a role he wholeheartedly does so such as he did VA work for the Joker in the batman series. It tends to be a bit more of something that people take notice of comparatively.

In general, it's not going to sway people though. People will use it for either sides opinions no matter what he says. He could say he absolutely hated TJA and people would try and spin it otherwise, he could say he loved it with his heart and people would spin it otherwise.

 Overread wrote:
I wonder if the Third film might answer Snokes history. If we consider that the remains of the Rebellion can fit onto the Falcon and lost most of their upper ranks and lower ranks at the same time then it might be that the Rebels can't win by a major military feat again.


So we might well see Rey or others go on a quest to find out more about Snoke; how he came to power so fast; how he equipped and armed the First Order - ergo the history of the Order beyond it being remnant of the Imperial Fleet (as its very clear the First Order is more than just remains).

With the hope that if they find out about Snokes history it might lead them to how to defeat the First Order. Also it was hinted in this last film that not all the other Jedi in training were killed; Snoke might well have had a favourite, but he might have trained others as well

That sounds pretty good. Sadly, Disney has much worse plans I fear.

Well yes we know about the other Jedi he had with him. The Knights of Ren were mentioned back in TFA, and that Kylo was a master rank amongst them.

Speaking for myself, I didn't care who Snoke was.

The scenario is that the Resistance needs something to resist and Snoke's New Order fills that role. It doesn't really matter what their back story is, in my view.

Which would be okay to me if this was some new series with new lore to establish rather then an established setting with it's own internal logic and universe.

It is a bit biased to say such, but if this had been an entirely new series.. Well the first movie would still be a ripoff of Star Wars, we wouldn't have gone in with preconceptions either.

Well, there is a Snoke book coming out this year, but I doubt we'll get an answer on film. Afterall, we knew next to nothing about Palpatine for a good 16yrs and most people were ok with that.

What we really need more info on are the Knights of Ren, which only get a mention in TFA but nothing in TLJ.
If we don't see anything about these guys in IX, I will admit this series has bad writing (but I'm not admitting that yet)

Thing is with Palpatine we didn't really need to know much because we didn't really know much of anything of the before - Palpatine was a creature in the "now" along with the rest of that saga.

However for this new Trilogy we already know a huge chunk of the history; as a result everyone wants to know what happened in the decades since the Return of the Jedi and the rise of this new First Order and this new leader Snoke - we want to know why he arose then and only then; at the very least learn how he came to power if not his back-story.

 Overread wrote:
Thing is with Palpatine we didn't really need to know much because we didn't really know much of anything of the before - Palpatine was a creature in the "now" along with the rest of that saga.

However for this new Trilogy we already know a huge chunk of the history; as a result everyone wants to know what happened in the decades since the Return of the Jedi and the rise of this new First Order and this new leader Snoke - we want to know why he arose then and only then; at the very least learn how he came to power if not his back-story.

I agree with what you are saying. I was merely stating that Snoke is being portrayed in the same "creature in the now" way.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
It doesn't really matter what their back story is, in my view.

TBH I don't understand your perspective on this point. I can see that you may not care what the backstory is because, essentially, you don't care very much about the movie generally. But who Snoke is clearly does matter. The FO is not the Empire. It's some kind of radical new threat to galactic peace. Understanding its leader, who he is, what motivates him - this is essential to understanding what the FO is all about. Similarly, he turned Kylo Ren to the dark side and has acted as his mentor for years. So understanding Kylo, one of the main characters, is also a matter of knowing things about Snoke. I mean, sure, they are The Baddies. They are Bad because this is a Space Opera where you have to have Baddies. So if we're just going to regress to the level of, "who cares it's just Star Wars" that's fine - but apply it to the whole film, not just to people criticizing the film. If Star Wars doesn't need to be even basically competent because it's just dumb schlock, you're essentially conceding that TLJ is dumb schlock. Which isn't praise.

 Overread wrote:
Thing is with Palpatine we didn't really need to know much because we didn't really know much of anything of the before

We didn't need to know much about the Emperor (who had no name in RotJ) because the story wasn't about the rise of the Empire or the fall of Anakin Skywalker. By contrast, the Disney movies are about the rise of the FO (specifically as a vehicle of Snoke's agenda*) and the fall of Ben Solo. These elements are not a given for the very fact that these are SEQUELS.

This is weird even in TFA. Hux gives his maniacal anti-Republic speech but ... uh, does that have anything to do with Snoke? Like, is Snoke also rabidly anti-Republic? Why did Snoke approve the construction and use of Starkiller Base?

If the answer is just, Disney wanted a Death Star then, yes, people are justified in telling Disney to feth off.

So the OT is also dumb schlock then? Even after ROTJ we know very little about the Emperor beyond eeeeevil. We learn that he turned Vader but not how or why, and have no clue how he rose to power. We also know nothing about the order that he and Vader belong to.

He's the Emperor of the Empire and an evil Force wizard, but otherwise he's a blank slate and not a fully formed character. His death has no meaning to us beyond the end of the Empire as we know it and Vader's turn. But that works well enough.

Snoke's end echoes this, because his death is about Kylo's ascension to control of the FO. It's actually an improvement on the OT model, since like Vader he's more interesting than his boss ever was.

EDIT: I don't see how this trilogy is about the rise of the FO or Snoke. Clearly those things already happened. And I think it's curious to characterize the FO as a radical new threat when it's very obviously presented as the remnants of the old Empire.

That just speaks to the way TLJ ignores the setup of TFA. In TFA we meet The First Order. They're kinda like the Empire, but more Nazi. And then in TLJ they're like, "Nazis? Who said anything about Nazis?"

 bbb wrote:
And then in TLJ they're like, "Nazis? Who said anything about Nazis?"

Well, to be fair, TLJ certainly has a Nazi color palette.

 Manchu wrote:

Thing is with Palpatine we didn't really need to know much because we didn't really know much of anything of the before

We didn't need to know much about the Emperor (who had no name in RotJ) because the story wasn't about the rise of the Empire or the fall of Anakin Skywalker. By contrast, the Disney movies are about the rise of the FO (specifically as a vehicle of Snoke's agenda*) and the fall of Ben Solo. These elements are not a given for the very fact that these are SEQUELS.

This is weird even in TFA. Hux gives his maniacal anti-Republic speech but ... uh, does that have anything to do with Snoke? Like, is Snoke also rabidly anti-Republic? Why did Snoke approve the construction and use of Starkiller Base?

If the answer is just, Disney wanted a Death Star then, yes, people are justified in telling Disney to feth off.

Where have you got that this trilogy is to do with the rise of the First Order? The First Order had already risen at the beginning of TFA, hence the official peace between the New Republic and the FO, with the Resistance engaging in an unofficial war.

As for why Snoke wanted Starkiller Base, what better way to kill the entire political leadership, not to mention the fleet, of his only military competitor? The Loss of Starkiller Base wasn't even that big of a blow considering it had achieved its main objective. In reality, it made more sense for the First Order to build Starkiller Base than it did for the Empire to build the Death Star, considering the enemy of the First Order had a centralised structure to target.

Isn't it pretty well established that the Death Star was a pretty dumb idea in universe? All the eggs in one basket, sort of thing?

The idea of the Death Star was to destroy the concept of the Republic. Don't forget at the very start of a New Hope the senate was still functioning. The Emperor had control, but only so far as the senate allowed him to up until that point.

So he built the Death Star; the idea being that once he dissolved the senate (a massive thing really that was only commented on in brief during the film) each regional (planet/system) area would control itself. With the Imperial army ruling over all - with the Death Star (and likely in time, multiple death stars) allowing him to have the ultimate threat to prevent any world from turning against Imperial Order.

The idea of the Death Star is that it would have fired a handful of times and then been a massive threat to any world that disobeyed.
It's like a nuclear weapon today - with the only differences being that only the Empire would have had one - and they would use it without worry o fallout (ergo its not an idle threat).


First Order took that tech to a new level to produce a long ranged planet killer in order to, again, fracture the unity of the worlds.

 gorgon wrote:
So the OT is also dumb schlock then?

RotJ is pretty scholcky yes, no point in pretending it is some kind of masterpiece. But it's better than The Last Jedi by miles. And moreover, ESB is an actual masterpiece - the argument that TLJ doesn't have to be competent because Star Wars is schlock ignores that while Star Wars has been truly dire (prequels) it's not perforce the nonsensical garbage we get through most of TLJ.

 gorgon wrote:
Even after ROTJ we know very little about the Emperor [...]

Already addressed above.

 gorgon wrote:
I don't see how this trilogy is about the rise of the FO or Snoke. Clearly those things already happened.

No, what you are seeing in TFA is the literally explosive entrance of the FO onto the galactic political stage.

 gorgon wrote:
And I think it's curious to characterize the FO as a radical new threat when it's very obviously presented as the remnants of the old Empire.

That is actually incorrect. The actual Galactic Empire still exists, albeit as the merest shadow of its former self. They have a peace treaty with the Republic. Courscant is still its capital. By contrast, the FO is indeed a new threat built together by Snoke and hardliner Imperials who rejected peace. It's not your fault that you got this wrong; TFA should have explained it. Same goes for this:

 A Town Called Malus wrote:
The First Order had already risen at the beginning of TFA, hence the official peace between the New Republic and the FO, with the Resistance engaging in an unofficial war.

The FO was never at peace with the Republic. The FO exists because its founders, aside from Snoke, explicitly rejected this peace.

 A Town Called Malus wrote:
As for why Snoke wanted Starkiller Base, what better way to kill the entire political leadership, not to mention the fleet, of his only military competitor?

Competitor for what? Snoke's goals are never explained so his war against the Republic doesn't make any sense. It makes sense why second-generation Imperial hardliners like Hux hate the Republic. Why Hux's boss leads the organization this way, however, is a mystery.

 A Town Called Malus wrote:

 Manchu wrote:

Thing is with Palpatine we didn't really need to know much because we didn't really know much of anything of the before

We didn't need to know much about the Emperor (who had no name in RotJ) because the story wasn't about the rise of the Empire or the fall of Anakin Skywalker. By contrast, the Disney movies are about the rise of the FO (specifically as a vehicle of Snoke's agenda*) and the fall of Ben Solo. These elements are not a given for the very fact that these are SEQUELS.

This is weird even in TFA. Hux gives his maniacal anti-Republic speech but ... uh, does that have anything to do with Snoke? Like, is Snoke also rabidly anti-Republic? Why did Snoke approve the construction and use of Starkiller Base?

If the answer is just, Disney wanted a Death Star then, yes, people are justified in telling Disney to feth off.

Where have you got that this trilogy is to do with the rise of the First Order? The First Order had already risen at the beginning of TFA, hence the official peace between the New Republic and the FO, with the Resistance engaging in an unofficial war.

As for why Snoke wanted Starkiller Base, what better way to kill the entire political leadership, not to mention the fleet, of his only military competitor? The Loss of Starkiller Base wasn't even that big of a blow considering it had achieved its main objective. In reality, it made more sense for the First Order to build Starkiller Base than it did for the Empire to build the Death Star, considering the enemy of the First Order had a centralised structure to target.

It was an official peace between the New Republic and the Empire, with the First Order as a risen terrorist group.

The worst name in Star Wars, after Jar Jar Binks,

Is Snoke.

Supreme Leader Snoke. What garbage.

Yes, it's a terrible name but it might have eventually developed a better ring to it (e.g., Boba Fett, Count Dooku) if the character had not turned out to be a mascot for the IDGAF school of screenwriting.

I disagree. I counter with Sheev Palpatine that they eventually saddled him.

He needed a title though that's for sure.

 ZebioLizard2 wrote:

Backfire wrote:

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

Sorry to bring this up again, but it's interesting to actually watch through some interviews from that same string of interviews. If you search youtube you can find a few videos where Mark is being interviewed by various web folks while wearing the same clothes with the same background, it seems they set up just to do a bunch of quick interviews one after the other. Mark actually looks like he's getting a bit sick of interviews during this particular set of them

If you watch a few of them I still don't get the impression Mark liked how he had to portray Luke, at best I think he recognised that Luke shouldn't be playing a large part because it's about the new kids. Even in Mark's twitter post he says he regrets voicing his concerns, but didn't actually state anything contrary to his previously stated opinions about Luke.

I think Mark still wasn't happy about Luke's portrayal but just accepts the movie wasn't about him*** and regrets giving haters something to point to when they're complaining about the film.

While I am not 100% happy with treatment of Luke in the movie myself, is this really subject we need to dwell on any longer? Do people remember anymore that Alec Guinness hated the part of Obi-Wan and thought his dialogue was awful and childish and TBH, it shows in his performance. He only took the part because of huge wads of cash he made from it.

Given that to him at the time it was a one time role in something he didn't expect to do amazingly. And on the other hand you have someone who constantly comes back for cameo's, loved discussing it with fans, and in general has practically embraced the role.

Didn't Harrison Ford hate playing Han Solo as well? In that case I don't think it hurt Han as a character.

But yeah, Mark clearly likes Luke. Before watching TLJ I had heard some of Mark's comments and just assumed that maybe Mark had built Luke up in his mind to be something different. After watching the movie I feel the opposite, like Rian hadn't even seen the original trilogy to think about how Luke should be behaving in TLJ.

In general, it's not going to sway people though. People will use it for either sides opinions no matter what he says. He could say he absolutely hated TJA and people would try and spin it otherwise, he could say he loved it with his heart and people would spin it otherwise.

I've tried to not go beyond what Mark has said in his own words. I reckon Mark genuinely like TLJ as a movie, but it's clear he doesn't like the portrayal of Luke. So I've only bought up Mark's comments in that same respect, with regard to character flaws with Luke specifically.

In some aspects at least I feel like I'm on the same page as Mark. I enjoyed the movie, I just think it has a whole bunch of glaring flaws which if fixed could have taken it from "enjoyable action flick" to "good movie worth putting on a pedestal". One of those things is how Luke was portrayed.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 insaniak wrote:
The 'laser sword' reference was another throwback. Anakin refers to Qui Gon's laser sword in TPM, which is in turn a nod to Lucas, as that's what he originally wanted to call them before everyone else involved convinced him the 'light saber' would be a better choice.

Interesting throwback.... they should have made another character use it though so it didn't make Luke look like someone in the early stages of dementia.

And his almost-murder of Kylo is explained in the movie. He refused to kill his father because he could sense the good in him. In Ben Solo, he could find only darkness.

Sorry but that just sounds like BS to try and handwave away something Luke wouldn't do. He could only find darkness? In a kid? A kid of his best mate and his sister? A kid who is blatantly obviously presented as conflicted (thus can't be only dark inside)? That's just weaksauce.

I could believe Luke being a poor teacher who couldn't teach Kylo, but not doing what he did.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:
they should have made another character use it though so it didn't make Luke look like someone in the early stages of dementia

LOL good point. FWIW, I didn't see it as an allusion to George Lucas but as an attempt at irony, with Luke deliberately undermining the mystique of the light saber by calling it a name that someone who doesn't give a gak about SW would call it. "Johnny, clean up your damn toy! I just stepped on a laser sword or something!"

AllSeeingSkink wrote:
He could only find darkness? In a kid? A kid of his best mate and his sister? A kid who is blatantly obviously presented as conflicted (thus can't be only dark inside)? That's just weaksauce.

Yes that is correct - PLUS, if there is "only darkness" there then ... the fething movie needs to explain why that is the case.

I'm actually disappointed in Mark. I guess he needed the money. Though he made something like 20 million through NCIS. He could have just told them to shove it and they would of had to change his role to his bidding.

I am SOOO sorry to bring this up, but I was actually feeling guilty that at nearly every scene with Leia I expected her demise just to answer the question of what happens in IX with her character.

*** RIP sweet Carrie*** sniff...

 Manchu wrote:

AllSeeingSkink wrote:
He could only find darkness? In a kid? A kid of his best mate and his sister? A kid who is blatantly obviously presented as conflicted (thus can't be only dark inside)? That's just weaksauce.

Yes that is correct - PLUS, if there is "only darkness" there then ... the fething movie needs to explain why that is the case.

I took this scene (in which Ben is clearly NOT a boy, but a very young man) to be that Snoke was not only corrupting Ben, but distorting the thoughts of Luke too.
We have no idea if Luke even knew of Snoke's existence at that moment. Snoke could have been working behind the scenes to manipulate Luke's doubts about Ben so that he "only saw darkness"
Afterwards, Luke would have just thought Snoke was tempting Ben

Snoke's ability to manipulate minds through the force is established (he connected Kylo and Rey's thoughts). So why is it such a stretch to imagine that Snoke was working both Ben and Luke against each other to further push Ben to the dark side? Luke may not have known this at the time and still cannot shake the guilt?

OR, Luke only saw darkness, but that doesn't mean only darkness existed. This could easily be a similar situation as Anakin and Padme, (so like father, like son), in which the Character sees a powerful vision of a possible future and in their effort to stop it, they end up causing it.

-

Snoke likely started work almost as soon as Palpatine fell so its not a stretch to consider that he was behind the events at the training school. Especially when you consider that Kylo didn't just run from his master trying to kill him, but also destroyed the training camp and took other students with him whilst killing others.

That's a huge stretch for a character who, when he went to bed, was totally unaware of being at any threat.

Curious that Snoke didn't use that moment to kill Luke - if he was part of that moment - though could be that Snokes control at distance was limited - could even be that Snoke intended all the trainees to die but that Kylo rejected that (just like he didn't strike Luke down fully)

 Galef wrote:
I took this scene (in which Ben is clearly NOT a boy, but a very young man) to be that Snoke was not only corrupting Ben, but distorting the thoughts of Luke too.

Galef, that's a perfectly fine rationalization/speculation. But it's not an explanation that appears in the film.