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 Manchu wrote:

 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.

What they could have done during the throne room scene, was have Snoke gloat about how he influenced the mind of Kylo into thinking Luke was attacking him and have him be the overall architect of the whole situation, then go on about Kylo being weak willed and how he'd be nothing without him. Or something.

I think it Snoke were any more insulting in that scene it would have been too obvious that he wanted Kylo to turn against him. As it stands whilst we saw Snoke cut in half there's still an outside chance that Snoke (or the force controlling Snoke) organised that rising of Kyle - possibly in a bid to have Rey join him - knowing that Rey would never joint Snoke, but that through the mind link she might have joined Kylo.

Whilst its not a plot line I can see them certainly following, its a potential one at the very least.

Honestly i think the movie was confused. It didn't totally know what it wanted to do. It just needed a more cohesive plot. Some scenes amounted doing much of nothing for the rebels. Then they could've done other things and gotten far less losses later on. Will explain later but my internet is about to cut out.

I don't think Star Wars is "dumb schlock". I think it's a space fantasy action epic.

It's not a detective film or a documentary, so it presents a different kind of content and plot.

Star Wars draws on common legendary archetypes such as the princess needing help, the farmboy become hero, the evil magician, etc.
Also, by the 9th film in the series, it has generated its own set of tropes and themes, for example that the hero will be strong in the Force, and the Force will enable the hero to be effective, but the hero will be opposed by someone strong in the dark side of the Force.

From this angle it's clear that Snoke is an evil magician/king character. To me it simply is unnecessary to document his back story. To do so would slow down the exciting progression of space fights and spectacular alien worlds, which is the true strength of Star Wars films.

OTOH it is necessary to explain Ren and Luke's back story, to show why Luke has become a disillusioned old man hiding on a remote island when people may have expected him to burst out as a hero to save the rebellion.

The way things are set up, understanding why Luke and Ben are the people they've become requires a better understnading of Snoke. It's not a matter of Snoke for Snoke's sake, as it were.

To me, I was able to understand or perhaps accept the Snoke story in the minimal way it was presented in the film.

I think that extra detail would be better presented in a novel or sourcebook.

 Galef wrote:
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.

AIUI, some Snoke information has already been released in "new EU" material and there are no "shocking" revelations there. They already flat out stated he is not Plagueis. I think this is good - they really needed to move out of "in this enormous galaxy, every bad guy is a Sith and all heroes are related to Skywalkers" -paradigm.

I agree with the sentiment that more information should have been provided from First Order. I mean it is pretty confusing watching the TFA: apparently "Republic" is a neighbour state of First Order, who nuke them with Starkiller. The Resistance seems like some other state, but why they call themselves "Resistance"? Seems pretty weird name for a state..
It all does make sense when you read the background - it is retelling of story how Third Reich came to being, with rump Empire as Weimar Republic and First Order as Nazi Party who rebels against "shameful" treaty of Versailles and its restrictions. But you shouldn't have to read the outside information to get the movie! I think what happened is that they read all the criticism of the prequels, how there was too much boring political dialogue (in reality there wasn't so much of it, it just was really boring). I am pretty sure they cut out LOTS of exposition from TFA script to make it absolutely sure audience won't get bored. Now, instead they got confused - but that was seen lesser evil as bored. TFA was committee work where they wanted to take no risks at all.

^If you know the above bit about First Order, you don't need to know anything more about Snoke. Then you already know why First Order is and what makes them tick, and its obvious they need a leader and Snoke is that guy. But we weren't told that, so the Snoke arc also feels unresolved.

In WW2, all you needed to know was that Hitler is a bad dude who invaded your country and had some pretty horrible policies. You didn't need to know he was disgruntled WW1 vet who had lived in poverty in Vienna. And there was never a scene where Hitler mocked Churchill and revealed he was in fact reborn Emperor Wilhelm II.

 Galef wrote:

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)

Knights of Ren is almost only unresolved plotline left in the saga, so it is very obvious they will follow that route. In fact it almost writes itself: they need a new villain who is scarier than Hux and more evil than Kylo. Episode 9 will probably open with a meeting of Knights of Ren. Some of them might not be happy about Kylo's Supreme Leadership and question his position. One of them is REALLY evil and thinks Kylo is a wuss and wants to do something which even he thinks is excessive (though it is pretty hard to think what this could be, since Kylo Ren already cheered on when First Order massacred billions of civilians). They butt heads through the movie and eventually come to confrontation where Kylo Ren discovers even he has limits and redeems himself tiny bit by stopping the other Knight from doing something truly horrible. Rey cries, everyone else cheers, fireworks, roll credits.

What I am curious about is if they will show the rump Empire. And if they do, who is the current Emperor?

 Kilkrazy wrote:
From this angle it's clear that Snoke is an evil magician/king character. To me it simply is unnecessary to document his back story.

I think you completely miss the point of backstory then.

I don't need backstory to tell me what role a character plays (in fact one of the coolest things about giving a backstory is the potential of making it a winding path so that you DON'T know what role the character is playing). I like backstory to give me a reason to care about a character, whether it's the hero or the villain.

At no point was I wondering about what roles Snoke, Rey, Kylo, Finn, Poe and whoever else played. The backstory is partly there to place them in the universe and partly as a springboard for actually giving a crap about the character. It's not the ONLY thing nor is it even always necessary, it's just one part of the puzzle to make compelling characters that we care about and in turn care about the story as a whole.

One of the nice things about a trilogy vs a one off is sometimes you can start off with no backstory but build a character through real time development or gradual exposition so that by the last movie you feel like you've grown with the character. You get an impression of them from the first movie which you hold with you from the moment you leave the cinema until a year or two or three when the next one comes out and then you grow further with them in that movie and so on until the last movie when the gak hits the fan.

If the writers and directors have done their jobs right, by the last movie nothing more than a look or a single sentence can be enough to elicit great emotion.

The shame about Snoke dying the way he did is that it looked like they were building him up to be something and cut it short such that his death drew forth zero emotion. Instead he's just generic bad guy who we don't give a crap about, it could have been a faceless Stormtrooper for all I cared. A wasted opportunity.

I don't think the Knights of Ren are going to supersede Kylo in any way, he was their master even before he became Supreme Leader. My guess based on what we have so far is that they were the handful of students who helped Kylo take down Luke's temple, but unlike Kylo I don't think they were ever Snoke's apprentice. I expect them to function something like the Inquisitors in the Empire, hunting down potential Jedi and rumours of rebellion, trained in the Dark Side but with a focus purely on combat and interrogation. I also don't think they'll have sabers; if Kylo is their leader and even he only has a cracked crystal blade then I can't imagine his subordinates having anything more than the kind of weapons Snoke's guard have.

I could see a situation where Kylo calls the Knights together and challenges them to test their strength against one another, leaving most dead and taking the last as his apprentice. This would help set him up as a true Supreme Leader with his own lackey (just as Ren was to Snoke and Vader was to Palpatine), and answer the question of where the Knights are pretty resolutely.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

The shame about Snoke dying the way he did is that it looked like they were building him up to be something and cut it short such that his death drew forth zero emotion. Instead he's just generic bad guy who we don't give a crap about, it could have been a faceless Stormtrooper for all I cared. A wasted opportunity.

He couldn't have served his purpose in the narrative as a faceless Stormtrooper. But he could have as a reincarnated Palpatine, or a surviving Plagius, or an ancient Jedi from the Old Republic, or any number of other ideas that were mooted. But any 'reveal' there would have made absolutely no difference to that scene or its stakes and would be done purely for shock value and so a few 'fans' could loudly proclaim that their theory was right.

Snoke was never a character. Snoke was a step in Kylo Ren's journey, which is the only element of that relationship that actually matters.

'Snoke tortures Rey, taunts Kylo, is killed by Kylo' serves exactly the same purpose as 'Snoke tortures Rey, taunts Kylo, turns out to be (INSERT THING HERE), is killed by Kylo'. The only difference is that in the latter, you have to break all the tension of that incredible set of scenes to stop and explain the 'reveal' to an audience that largely won't understand, appreciate or care about it and just want to get back to the story of the characters that actually matter, which in this film is almost exclusively Rey, Ren and Luke. (Finn, Poe and Rose are all great characters whose scenes are enjoyable, but their storylines are incidental to the central thrust of the movie)

@AllSeeingSkink

Good point that "backstory" isn't just a matter of trivia but rather constitutes characterization. But I think Kilkrazy is arguing that we don't need to care about Snoke as a character, and so he doesn't need a backstory. And that's fair enough.

The issue with Snoke isn't that we need to care about him. The issue is, his character is key to why the plot is happening at all. He has apparently masterminded the rise of the First Order. He also apparently schemed to destroy the new Jedi order and seduce Ben Solo to the dark side. Why?

"Because we want to make money on Star Wars sequels," is not a sufficient explanation.

The term "backstory" is just a red herring. What is required - and bizarrely missing - is motivation, goals, and stakes.

Fair enough if we don't need to care about Snoke specifically.

My problem was I was struggling to care about most of the main characters in the film. I think some weren't too badly but for the most part at this stage I don't care about most of them - which is not somewhere I think I should be 2 films in to a trilogy. As a comparison by the end of The Two Towers I was invested in most of the main characters. Something like Sam's speech "That there's some good in this world, Mr Frodo, and it's worth fighting for", a line that sticks with me because of how well everything that led up to that point drew me in to caring about the characters.

I can live with not knowing certain aspects between the films (though would prefer if they were giving us a bit of a slow reveal rather than, well, nothing).

 Manchu wrote:

Good point that "backstory" isn't just a matter of trivia but rather constitutes characterization. But I think Kilkrazy is arguing that we don't need to care about Snoke as a character, and so he doesn't need a backstory. And that's fair enough.

The issue with Snoke isn't that we need to care about him. The issue is, his character is key to why the plot is happening at all. He has apparently masterminded the rise of the First Order. He also apparently schemed to destroy the new Jedi order and seduce Ben Solo to the dark side. Why?

Power doesn't need a motivation, power is its own motivation. Everybody knows this. Nothing like that was told about the Emperor in OT either. It's just that situation there was much clearer by default - there was an evil Empire led by evil Emperor - that was sufficient for a viewer. By contrast, First Order is much more ambiguously set up - much like Trade Federation in prequels.

@AllSeeingSkink

Yes, I agree. I think Kylo Ren has a lot of potential as a character. However, he could be a lot stronger if I had any actual idea of why he is so enmeshed in the dark side. I mean, this isn't a trivial issue considering that his character development and identity is fundamentally a question of him feeling conflicted about light and darkness ... so ... one would think explaining this would be obvious, right? And since Snoke is the one responsible for Ben falling, wouldn't it be obvious that you should explain how/why in the goddamn movie? Plus there's the whole, 'what the feth is going on in this setting anyway?' problem, which is also just a matter of explaining what Snoke is up to.

@Backfire

Uh, Snoke already has power. So he just wants more power? All the power? UNLIMITED POWAH??? Yeah, this is Prequels level garbage. Again, conceding that it's garbage doesn't amount to a defense of the film.

The FO is not ambiguous, really. The maniacal Hux speech makes it clear that the FO fanatically opposes liberal democracy. The problem is, why does Snoke care about hardliner Imperial politics? Because not only is he the leader but he also seems to be the one supplying the considerable resources (and the films constangly draw attention to the resource-poor Resistance in contrast to the overwhelming power of the FO), although this too is never explained. Neither the setting or plot really makes any sense without more information about Snoke.

 Manchu wrote:

Uh, Snoke already has power. So he just wants more power? All the power? UNLIMITED POWAH??? Yeah, this is Prequels level garbage. Again, conceding that it's garbage doesn't amount to a defense of the film.

But Snoke doesn't have all the power yet. He rules the First Order, but First Order doesn't rule everything, it is made abundantly clear. It rules much less than Empire did before Battle of Endor, and were we ever questioning Emperor's motivations?

 Manchu wrote:

The FO is not ambiguous, really. The maniacal Hux speech makes it clear that the FO fanatically opposes liberal democracy. The problem is, why does Snoke care about hardliner Imperial politics? Because not only is he the leader but he also seems to be the one supplying the considerable resources (and the films constangly draw attention to the resource-poor Resistance in contrast to the overwhelming power of the FO), although this too is never explained. Neither the setting or plot really makes any sense without more information about Snoke.

I disagree. Making up some "special" motivation for Snoke would have made the story less, not more. What if Snoke was bastard son of Palpatine who wanted revenge against Skywalkers? Would it made him a better villain? No. Searching for some personal retribution would have made him look petty and small-minded when he was already getting keys to the entire damn Galaxy. Also it would have continued the regrettable trend of Star Wars universe feeling restricted and inbred.

Of course, they could have made the story about Snoke seeking revenge, but then FO would have become nothing but a device for Snoke for his small goal. It's a possible route, but it was better route where the First Order was the end in itself. This is the scenario which they used in OT and it worked very well. We did not need to know about Snoke for the movie to work, just like we did not need to know about Emperor to make the movies work. Only problem was that First Order was too poorly explained, so that left people craving for more information about ANYTHING.

 Manchu wrote:


Yes, I agree. I think Kylo Ren has a lot of potential as a character. However, he could be a lot stronger if I had any actual idea of why he is so enmeshed in the dark side. I mean, this isn't a trivial issue considering that his character development and identity is fundamentally a question of him feeling conflicted about light and darkness ... so ... one would think explaining this would be obvious, right?

From what we have so far, I think it's a combination of factors that starts with Snoke's influence and ends with the glimpses we have of Ren's upbringing. Leia and Luke both refer to Snoke manipulating Ben Solo, but we also know that you can't just whammy someone onto the Dark Side, there has to be a trigger for all that.

My guess there is that it all ties into Ben Solo's family and his place within it; his mother is a political leader, his father is a war hero, his uncle is a Jedi Master, and he's... no one, really. But his grandfather was known and respected across the galaxy, and I think Snoke's promise to him is basically 'join me, and I will make you a second Vader.' Given all his lines about letting the past die and cutting it away, I figure a lot of it comes down to the immense weight of expectation placed on him just due to his heritage. Leia wants him to be the next Luke, Luke is terrified he'll become the next Vader, everyone expects him to be powerful and significant and what we don't yet know is whether he wanted any of that, or whether he just wanted to be Ben Solo.

For all the talk of who Snoke is or how the FO rose, the story I really want to see covered in some form is Ben Solo's before his fall. He's a fantastic character and there's so many elements to that that would be really fascinating to see. How was his relationship with his father and mother? Was Han ok with him becoming a Jedi, or did he want to keep him away from that (TFA states that it was Leia that sent him away)?

When he was training, was he close to Luke as family or was he just another student? Did Luke push him away even before the fall because he was afraid of there being another Vader (probably one of the reasons Luke doesn't have kids either)? Was he an inspiration to the other students at the academy because everyone expected a Skywalker to be a great Jedi, or was he a disappointment to them and an outcast?

I can't see any child of Han and Leia being a fundamentally bad person from the outset, but I can see all that weight of expectation slowly crushing him through his formative years, making him susceptible to Snoke's influence. If everyone expects him to be Someone, and then Snoke turns up and says that the easiest way to reach that point is to take the power for himself and follow in Vader's footsteps, that could easily appeal, especially after Luke's moment of weakness.

@Backfire

In contrast to Snoke, the Emperor's motivation is not required to explain anything about the setting, plot, or story.

Snoke's motivations could be explained in a way that makes SW more rather than less interetsing. For example, what if Snoke doesn't actually care about ruling an empire but needs an army of fanatics to pursue some other goal, related to the larger issue of the Force (tying in nicely to the relationships between Luke, Ben, and Rey)? There are plenty of creative, talented people in Hollywood who could come up with better ideas than you or I ... or, apparently, Disney executives.

@Paradigm

It's easy to care about Ben. First, he's related to no less than four characters we already care about and have cared about for decades. Second, he is a muti-dimensional character with clearly established motivation and complex problems. Third, his character arc provides an interesting connection/relationship to another character, Rey. Fourth, he has a cool look.

Yeah, I'd love to know why he actually became a bad guy. Although this story is ostensibly told THREE TIMES in TLJ the movie still fails to provide the key information, which relates to how/why Snoke corrupted him.

Backfire wrote:

 Manchu wrote:

Uh, Snoke already has power. So he just wants more power? All the power? UNLIMITED POWAH??? Yeah, this is Prequels level garbage. Again, conceding that it's garbage doesn't amount to a defense of the film.

But Snoke doesn't have all the power yet. He rules the First Order, but First Order doesn't rule everything, it is made abundantly clear. It rules much less than Empire did before Battle of Endor, and were we ever questioning Emperor's motivations?

 Manchu wrote:

The FO is not ambiguous, really. The maniacal Hux speech makes it clear that the FO fanatically opposes liberal democracy. The problem is, why does Snoke care about hardliner Imperial politics? Because not only is he the leader but he also seems to be the one supplying the considerable resources (and the films constangly draw attention to the resource-poor Resistance in contrast to the overwhelming power of the FO), although this too is never explained. Neither the setting or plot really makes any sense without more information about Snoke.

I disagree. Making up some "special" motivation for Snoke would have made the story less, not more. What if Snoke was bastard son of Palpatine who wanted revenge against Skywalkers? Would it made him a better villain? No. Searching for some personal retribution would have made him look petty and small-minded when he was already getting keys to the entire damn Galaxy. Also it would have continued the regrettable trend of Star Wars universe feeling restricted and inbred.

Of course, they could have made the story about Snoke seeking revenge, but then FO would have become nothing but a device for Snoke for his small goal. It's a possible route, but it was better route where the First Order was the end in itself. This is the scenario which they used in OT and it worked very well. We did not need to know about Snoke for the movie to work, just like we did not need to know about Emperor to make the movies work. Only problem was that First Order was too poorly explained, so that left people craving for more information about ANYTHING.

Well somehow in between the two films (which is a coupe of days?) the First Order goes from being backwater to controlling the whole galaxy and with a few hundred people opposing it - total. I assume that's why they don't care about loosing dreadnoughts or even the supergiant Snokeship - cos they won in a epic blitzkrieg that conquered everything in a day or two.

So by the start of TLJ he already has truly massive amount of power and seem quite comfortable about it. Its unclear why he even needs Kylo anymore and that seems to occur to him when they meet aboard the Snokeship. He has truly massive amounts of armies and ships and stuff, a emo Vader wannabee serves what purpose apart from alleviating the boredom of total power.

A more ambitious film might look at what happens when you do in fact have total power as Ben seems to be set for inheriting - what do you do now, what incentives do you have - Snoke and co don't seem to have families, the only person who Ben seems to have a connection to has just run off, so now you have a young man with gigantic war machine at your disposal, the power of life and death over hundreds of worlds and their populations and unstable and dubious advisors - what do you do and why?

But I guess it will just be funny useless robots and not-puffins unite to defeat the evil with the power of love - or something.



Problem is that the film was more interested in tie-in commercial Casino's and soft toys than anything else.

I've been thinking about Rey's new Light Saber...And I really want it to be a double bladed purple light saber.

Double bladed would be appropriate because of how skilled she is with a quarter-staff, and she could even incorporate her old staff into the handle as others have mentioned earlier.

And it should be purple, to reflect how she is attuned with both the Light and Dark side of the force. Remind you of anyone? Thats right - Mace Windu, and his swanky purple light saber. And this would be a nice nod to the direction I want Disney to take new generations of Jedi - Grey Jedi, who utilize both sides of the force and seek a true balance between Light and Dark.

The less said about Mace Windu, the better. This includes purple lightsaber references.

"Grey Jedi" is pretty weak stuff. The problem is, Lucas portrayed Jedi as some kind of celibate Buddhist paladins in his Prequels. They live according to a strict(ish) monastic code but they are not particularly Good.

So yes, I would welcome a version of Jedi that were not so priggish and uptight and authoritarian.* I'd be (more than) okay with them having romantic relationships. But they still need to be heroic good guys. The Jedi knights (as in King Arthur's knights) should be adventurous, chivalrous do-gooders. Not bathrobed space cops.

Pushing down some other mystical hoo doo path is just more prequels garbage.

*Please see Tales of the Jedi for more.

A saber staff with a blade only at one end would be a nice weapon for her. Lightspear/halberd.

 Manchu wrote:
@AllSeeingSkink

Good point that "backstory" isn't just a matter of trivia but rather constitutes characterization. But I think Kilkrazy is arguing that we don't need to care about Snoke as a character, and so he doesn't need a backstory. And that's fair enough.

The issue with Snoke isn't that we need to care about him. The issue is, his character is key to why the plot is happening at all. He has apparently masterminded the rise of the First Order. He also apparently schemed to destroy the new Jedi order and seduce Ben Solo to the dark side. Why?

"Because we want to make money on Star Wars sequels," is not a sufficient explanation.

The term "backstory" is just a red herring. What is required - and bizarrely missing - is motivation, goals, and stakes.

Honestly Manchu while i thought it was kinda cool how Ben betrayed him it seemed kind of like a pushover moment for somebody that was manipulating Ben and Rey. Also he tells his apprentice what he did and gives him reason to betray snoke. Course maybe snoke was a bit arrogant and didn't expect that betrayal. In the case of the story though what i really HATED was the fact they didn't give him more character. It's not just doing it for that sake but telling us where he came from, why he was there, why a sith lord came out of nowhere with no known name or previous background and started an extremist military movement that somehow managed to over-power the current military force in the galaxy with nobody from 'the resistance' noticing. There's a million questions about snoke left un-answered and they probably never will be considering we're already on the 2nd film. If another dark side version of somebody doesn't pop up the whole background of snoke will be entirely pointless. He's a big bad one dimensional villain that came out of ****ing nowhere. I realize the emperor sorta wasn't fleshed out much either in the original trilogy but in his case there's a hint at more having happened before the original trilogy and low and behold he orchestrated the whole creation of the empire and he was given plenty of depth then. In the case of snoke i don't realize where they can talk about him. The original trilogy has nothing having to do with him and the new trilogy gave him no backstory whatsoever. You can't just make somebody the most powerful bad guy and not give him even anything resembling a story somewhere in the lore. It just makes the bad guy feel empty and lack depth of any kind.

I'll write more later but let's be honest if i wrote more now it wouldn't be read. Walls of text have a habit of destroying anybody's attention span.

 Manchu wrote:
The less said about Mace Windu, the better. This includes purple lightsaber references.

"Grey Jedi" is pretty weak stuff. The problem is, Lucas portrayed Jedi as some kind of celibate Buddhist paladins in his Prequels. They live according to a strict(ish) monastic code but they are not particularly Good.

So yes, I would welcome a version of Jedi that were not so priggish and uptight and authoritarian.* I'd be (more than) okay with them having romantic relationships. But they still need to be heroic good guys. The Jedi knights (as in King Arthur's knights) should be adventurous, chivalrous do-gooders. Not bathrobed space cops.

Pushing down some other mystical hoo doo path is just more prequels garbage.

*Please see Tales of the Jedi for more.

Sounds good to me!

And now apparently I need to find Tales of the Jedi?

 Manchu wrote:
The less said about Mace Windu, the better. This includes purple lightsaber references.

"Grey Jedi" is pretty weak stuff. The problem is, Lucas portrayed Jedi as some kind of celibate Buddhist paladins in his Prequels. They live according to a strict(ish) monastic code but they are not particularly Good.

So yes, I would welcome a version of Jedi that were not so priggish and uptight and authoritarian.* I'd be (more than) okay with them having romantic relationships. But they still need to be heroic good guys. The Jedi knights (as in King Arthur's knights) should be adventurous, chivalrous do-gooders. Not bathrobed space cops.

Pushing down some other mystical hoo doo path is just more prequels garbage.

*Please see Tales of the Jedi for more.

I might be in the minority but I really liked the Buddhist paladin shtick. However, grey Jedi Luke or Rey I think would have been the most interesting way to go with the story.

If Manchu is referring to the Dark Horse comic series I quite enjoyed those. Have all the DH omnibuses.

 Alpharius wrote:
And now apparently I need to find Tales of the Jedi?

Available in convenient omnibus format:
Volume One
Volume Two

Unfortunately, they have become super expensive.

 Eldarain wrote:
If Manchu is referring to the Dark Horse comic series I quite enjoyed those.

Yes, I am referring to those. For many years, those comics were all we really knew of the past of this setting. Before the dark times; before the Prequels.

 Xenomancers wrote:
I really liked the Buddhist paladin shtick

butwhy.gif

Truly, it's dire stuff. Why can't they be more like actual knights? Why, for example, are they celibate? I mean, I know the actual answer is, so George Lucas could right a "love story.

 flamingkillamajig wrote:
what i really HATED was the fact they didn't give him more character

In a way, you're preaching to the choir. After all, I am the main person arguing that TFA and TLJ do a completely gak job explaining key concepts necessary for the plot to have any meaning, i.e., WTF is this conflict about, WTF is going on with the Force, and WTF is Kylo Ren so angsty about? I would say it's no coincidence that some further characterization of Snoke could help shed (obligatory, necessary, required, non-optional, non-trivial, non-extra) light on these rather important points. But TFA set this stuff up as intentionally mysterious. And TLJ has no genuine interest in any of it.

OTOH I hate Snoke. I hate that Disney SW has to invent a Palpatine rip-off as the master for a Faux Vader so the two of them can rule the Not Empire. I hate his stupid name. I hate his lame ass visual design. I hate that he's introduced in a deliberately withholding style.

So I was happy to see Kylo Ren bisect him. But that should have been the climax of the movie and it should have taken place after the movie explained some stuff about him, like this whole "awakening" business/why he wants to kill off the Jedi, how/why he is in charge of the FO, and how he turned Ben Solo.

While i liked the whole bit with Rey and Ben i didn't like a lot of the other sub-plots.

Not-Leia and Poe (going for a han solo-leia relationship) exchange arguments and she has a plan she never speaks to poe or the rest of the crew about which leads poe, finn and chubby asian girl (can't remember her name) to go to casino world, find master saboteur, fail at their mission and kill more rebels. In fact had Not-Leia just told the plan there'd be no heroic sacrifice and more rebels would've lived. Course there'd be more FO people too. Honestly if it was that easy to kill the FO why'd they not do that sooner? Anyway it made that whole relationship thing between Poe and Not-Leia pointless and there was no depth about Not-Leia making the heroic sacrifice less impactful. It honestly should've been Leia to make said heroic sacrifice and the event should've been started by Poe's hot-headedness as a lesson in not being so hot-headed. Instead it was started by seemingly incompetent leadership which led to no character development. Most of that sub-plot just felt empty. It kinda really annoyed me.

 Xenomancers wrote:
grey Jedi Luke or Rey I think would have been the most interesting way to go with the story

The most interesting direction would have been:

- no Vice Admiral Holdo or Rose Tico
- Finn and Poe go on an adventure to save the Resistance fleet/find Luke and Rey
- Luke explains he believes defeating Sith/reviving the Jedi "awoke" Snoke, because the Force = balance
- Luke went into hiding and severed his connection to the Force to restrain the power of Snoke and Kylo
- realizing that this plan failed and Rey's power is the result of the Force balancing against Snoke training Kylo, Luke agrees to train Rey
- in the course of her training, Rey realizes that she and Kylo can find balance together
- Luke thinks it's too dangerous/reflects on his own rushing to confront Vader/rushing to teach Ben Solo
- at this point in the Finn/Poe story, Leia dies somehow - Luke feels it through the Force; realizing his family and friends are dead, he wonders if Rey is right
- Rey goes to Kylo but he rejects her pleas as "Jedi sentimentality"
- Finn and Poe figure out how to save the Resistance fleet/obligatory space battle
- in a climactic moment, Kylo changes his mind and betrays Snoke; they face and defeat Snoke together
- movie ends with Kylo reaching out to Rey just as TFA ended with Rey reaching out to Luke
- cue Star Wars music

 flamingkillamajig wrote:
if it was that easy to kill the FO why'd they not do that sooner?

Same bs happens in R1 when the Rebels just ram their ram ships into Star Destroyers.

 Eldarain wrote:
A saber staff with a blade only at one end would be a nice weapon for her. Lightspear/halberd.

That could work. Double ended lightsabers just lead to stupid fighting styles and the sequels have been far better than the prequels in that regard.


I'm still a little confused that Kylo Ren assumed so readily that Luke wanted to kill him. Luke had already decided against it so it's not as if Kylo Ren could've read that from him. Also Rey assuming that Ren was telling the proof to the point of clobbering Luke from behind speaks poorly of her character. Luke telling her because she was willing to kill him was weird too.

I agree at disliking rose in many ways. I feel like she was made for the sake of the writer trying to write themselves into it. Also possibly admitting it might have been a politically correct character. However considering some movies and shows about hapless beta male losers getting the beautiful girl normally reserved for the alpha male makes me go easier on her character.

My main issue with rose though is when she tried to prevent Finn making a heroic sacrifice because 'i love you! *kiss*'. My issue from that is they went on a mission called 'Operation BS' where they take salt-speeders to do....something to the FO i guess. As Finn is about to make the whole run mean something she saves him which allows the FO to get at the resistance base. Which is absolutely stupid. I mean she could've taken the fall for him which would've sucked and ****-blocked Finn's heroic moment but it'd have a reason. Instead that whole run against the FO did nothing and people died needlessly.

My issue with a lot of the movie is in many cases it feels like it can't commit to something. Poe's and Not-Leia's not-romance, Finn's heroic not-sacrifice and Luke dying or not to buy time for the resistance.

TLJ could easily have been a good movie. See bullet points above.

Rose and Holdo are both totally unnecessary. Rose gives a cheesy speech about rich people being corrupt. Bold card for Disney to play. She then does something that has every probability of killing Finn (and her) to "save him" and gives a cheesy speech about love. Holdo exists so Poe learns not to make heroic sacrifices even though that's exactly what she does. These characters are fething garbage by every measure.

TLJ had it pretty easy. Audiences already like Rey, Kylo, Finn and Poe. So you'd obviously let Finn and Poe have a fun adventure B Plot, right? You know, to balance out the heavier A Plot of Rey and Kylo. Wrong, you split them up and introduce new, unlikable characters to constantly undermine them because you want to portray them as idiots and failures. So there is no fun in the movie.

FFS.