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 BobtheInquisitor wrote:
or did you come up with that?

That was a Manchu Original.™

 Manchu wrote:
Were these tales any good? If so, I'm in.

I still love them precisely because they are so weird and yet they feel Star Wars-y. I guess the context is super important. SW was probably at or near the nadir of its brand value in 1993 so they could risk doing weird stuff. Plus it was just some comic book series. I won't tell you these are great comics (1990s DH art warning!) but they do construct a believable ancient past for the SW setting and create a few great characters and concepts along the way.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:
The Kylo-Ren dynamic was one of the well handled things (though still not a huge fan of their characters individually speaking).

 Unit1126PLL wrote:
EDIT:
Like, literally, just Ctrl + A the script, hit Delete, and then write "try harder" and send it to a real writer. That probably would've made a better movie.

I'm not a very creative writer but I've been amazed how many cool concepts I've read from fans on how they think this movie should have been handled. From complete rewrites to just cleaning up a lot of the bad concepts to get a similar end result with less illogical and messy junk in the middle.

When random fans can come up with better concepts than an actual professional writing team and director it's not a great sign. Normally what fans write is mostly junk

Let's remember though, the ewok movie, the Christmas special and the black whole exist. Even George & Disney write horrible junk. Some of the fan made movies are really good, heck pink 5 was so good She's been added into other pieces like alliegence by Zahn.

 Galef wrote:
Well, with JJ at the helm, he could do for SW what he did for Star Trek. Time travel reboot!

Have Rey find out some new force projection power to not only project across space, but also time. She goes back and kills Palpatine before the Battle of Naboo. Anakin is not found by the Jedi and the Galactic Civil war never happens. But in an twist, the Republic still becomes a dictatorship and builds a Death Star to hold power, leading to a group of Jedi fighting against the Republic. Anakin finds his way into the conflict (as an adult now, with more maturity and without a lifetime of being told he is "the chosen one"). Anakin becomes the true hero that we all thought he was when Obi-wan talked about him to Luke.

Sound ridiculous? It should. This is what you are asking for if you want VIII "de-canonized". Why not de-canonize the Prequels while we are at it? At this point, time travel is the only way to de-canonize movies.

OOC problems demand OOC solutions. A time travel reboot doesn't fix the problems that make the new Star Wars movies bad; getting rid of Kennedy, Abrams and Johnson and starting over might.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
Both those points are covered in the film.

The Republic got offed by Starkiller in TFA, so who is The Resistance going to call for help?

 dogma wrote:

 Kilkrazy wrote:
Both those points are covered in the film.

The Republic got offed by Starkiller in TFA, so who is The Resistance going to call for help?

They're just going to do a random dial like a campaign.

"Hello, are you voting for the First Order in the upcoming months? If so, we'd like to talk to you for a moment about your decision..."

Only problem is they used the same line as the old Rebellion did when they had to do the same thing, and everyone had already autoblocked the number.

The film specifically mentions the outer rim systems (or something.)

 Kilkrazy wrote:
The film specifically mentions the outer rim systems (or something.)

Well Leia thought she had friends in the outer rim, but like usual you call up your friends to help you move and no one shows up.

Alternatively, that's the scene where we learn Leia suffers from dementia.

 Manchu wrote:
Alternatively, that's the scene where we learn Leia suffers from dementia.

And a fan theory is born! - Leia actually died when she got blown out the Raddus and the events of TLJ happen in her last few moments as her mind comes to grips with dying. The whole movie is just a death hallucination.

-

 Galef wrote:

 Manchu wrote:
Alternatively, that's the scene where we learn Leia suffers from dementia.

And a fan theory is born! - Leia actually died when she got blown out the Raddus and the events of TLJ happen in her last few moment her mind coming to grips with dying. The whole movie is just a death hallucination.

-

This man is an hero. He just saved J.J. Abrams.

 Kaiyanwang wrote:

 Galef wrote:

 Manchu wrote:
Alternatively, that's the scene where we learn Leia suffers from dementia.

And a fan theory is born! - Leia actually died when she got blown out the Raddus and the events of TLJ happen in her last few moment her mind coming to grips with dying. The whole movie is just a death hallucination.

-

This man is an hero. He just saved J.J. Abrams.

Does that make him a hero? ...Or a monster?

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:

 Kaiyanwang wrote:

 Galef wrote:

 Manchu wrote:
Alternatively, that's the scene where we learn Leia suffers from dementia.

And a fan theory is born! - Leia actually died when she got blown out the Raddus and the events of TLJ happen in her last few moment her mind coming to grips with dying. The whole movie is just a death hallucination.

-

This man is an hero. He just saved J.J. Abrams.

Does that make him a hero? ...Or a monster?

J.J. would say that from his point of view, Galef is an hero.
Then wink at the camera because he referenced another SW movie.

Also there is a genuine, reasonable chance that what you guys just discussed is better than what we are going to see.

I feel that The Last Jedi will not age that well as it is truely a product of the Twenty-Teens. The messages and themes it draws on are contemporary rather than timeless like the OT/Prequels.

Thoughts?

 Easy E wrote:
I feel that The Last Jedi will not age that well as it is truely a product of the Twenty-Teens. The messages and themes it draws on are contemporary rather than timeless like the OT/Prequels.

Thoughts?

This....could be true. Although arguably "timeless" has become a bit subjective even today due to the way technology has changed our culture in the last few decades.

Time will tell indeed.

-

 Easy E wrote:
I feel that The Last Jedi will not age that well as it is truely a product of the Twenty-Teens. The messages and themes it draws on are contemporary rather than timeless like the OT/Prequels.

Thoughts?

I think its more the heavy handed nature of the messaging that'll date it rather than the message(s) itself, to borrow from another great Sci-fi saga "the slow blade penetrates the shield", I refuse to belief the younger generations can't take on new (to them) points of view unless they are screamed at them in such an obvious and telegraphed ways

 Turnip Jedi wrote:
I refuse to belief the younger generations can't take on new (to them) points of view unless they are screamed at them in such an obvious and telegraphed ways

I'd like to agree with you, but this is the same generation that is willingly eating Tide pods. Assuming a certain level of stupidity is warranted, at least for some.

Is the Tide Pod Challenge a real thing or is it the Vodka Tampon Craze of the twenty-teens?


Regardless of how well TLJ ages, it has already thrown up huge obstacles for any future Star Wars writer to work around. Either it will be sidelined intentionally by the franchise caretakers (and likely the whole sequel trilogy), or Star Wars will have to make the Simpsons Choice: either maintain continuity of characters and setting, locking you into a narrower field of story possibilities than in the past, or kill the past and have any character do or say whatever will propel the story you want to tell this time regardless of the effect on the overall quality of the series. (The Simpsons chose the latter. Friends and Big Bang Theory chose the former. Either way, there was a marked change in quality over time.)

What is the message of TLJ?
That nothing matters? So why transmit messages.
That two opposed factions are two sides of the same coin? This happens in real life, when a cynical worldview wins.
That one should follow orders blindly? Is this what you want to teach younger people?
That you don't need training and humility, or at least training, arrogance and vision, to become good at something? Horrible.
Or that past does not matter? So when TLJ becomes an old movie, why watch it and learn from it.

Star Wars used to appeal to universal, archetypal values (in a very simplistic way, appropriate for the genre).
These movies are just cynical meta-commentaries. There is nothing to learn from them.

The message is that you shouldn't let your failures control your life and determine your future.

 A Town Called Malus wrote:
The message is that you shouldn't let your failures control your life and determine your future.

And this is shown exactly... how?
With which characters?

also that female suicide is heroic and noble if for the greater good, but if a chap (even a chap of colour) attempts the exact same thing 20mins later its not and he needs a moment of ladyminoritysplaining to put him right

 Kaiyanwang wrote:

 A Town Called Malus wrote:
The message is that you shouldn't let your failures control your life and determine your future.

And this is shown exactly... how?
With which characters?

Rey forcing Luke to come to terms with his failure with Ben, capped off by Yoda reminding him that failure is an important part of learning. Luke had let that failure dominate his life and future by sealing himself off and turned his feelings of failure onto the Jedi as a whole. His "return" and coming to terms with that failure is the climax of the film.

 A Town Called Malus wrote:

 Kaiyanwang wrote:

 A Town Called Malus wrote:
The message is that you shouldn't let your failures control your life and determine your future.

And this is shown exactly... how?
With which characters?

Rey forcing Luke to come to terms with his failure with Ben, capped off by Yoda reminding him that failure is an important part of learning. Luke had let that failure dominate his life and future by sealing himself off and turned his feelings of failure onto the Jedi as a whole. His "return" and coming to terms with that failure is the climax of the film.

It is also shown with Poe who fails several times in the movie by having a gung-ho attitude, then he learns from it by realizing Luke is stalling for time, rather than rushing out to help like he has done the whoel movie.

-

sirlynchmob wrote:

 Kilkrazy wrote:
The film specifically mentions the outer rim systems (or something.)

Well Leia thought she had friends in the outer rim, but like usual you call up your friends to help you move and no one shows up.

They are too busy dealing with the Chiss or Killik or Yuuzhan Vong showed up. Ewoks on Endor heard the call but were having trouble getting ships to come help, something about yub nub chub. Mandalore was busy with a civil war. That mixed in with the distance, by the time anyone showed up after dealing with whatever they were it was already too late.

 A Town Called Malus wrote:

Rey forcing Luke to come to terms with his failure with Ben, capped off by Yoda reminding him that failure is an important part of learning. Luke had let that failure dominate his life and future by sealing himself off and turned his feelings of failure onto the Jedi as a whole. His "return" and coming to terms with that failure is the climax of the film.

But Rey says that is Ben that failed him, not the other way around. Yoda looked odd, because Yoda is the guy that said "Do. Or do not. There is no try". Before saying that books are not important. No wait Rey has them. What does it even mean?
Really, what should I take from this story? It does not even stick to its own principle. Sacrifice heroic (Holdo). No wait, bad (Finn). No wait, heroic (Luke). So luke finally learns the past should not be a cage. So he sacrifices himself for his friends. While Finn has been stopped 5 mins before from doing the same. So the Finn scene alone undermines what is supposed to be the scene showing the theme of the movie.
Disregarding furthermore the fact that Luke was the dude that redeemed his father with an act of compassion and even gave Jabba a chance, but his failure is here trying to murder a child in his sleep. Then he flees because feth friends. While in empire loses an hand because is too attached.
Also, why we did not have a scene with the reaction of Luke to Han's death? This was something this horribly paced movie needed.

 Galef wrote:

It is also shown with Poe who fails several times in the movie by having a gung-ho attitude, then he learns from it by realizing Luke is stalling for time, rather than rushing out to help like he has done the whoel movie.

If Holdo is wrong (what I think, BTW), Poe is just treated unjustly like a child after he took out an important, dangerous, fleet-destroying spaceship.
If Holdo is right, Poe should be court martialed and possibly executed. That's a mutiny. He learns an important lesson over the blood of tens of fellow rebels, in that case. How in heaven is this supposed to be moral of the story? "Hey don't be gung-ho. You could cause the death of tens of people. Here, a slap on the wrist. Next time, cause the death of fellow freedom fighters in a smaller order of magnitude you little, adorable devil!"

Yoda's "do or do not" does not literally mean you either succeed or don't and that there is no value in failing. It means that you should never approach anything without the intention of succeeding and was a response to Luke's scepticism about what the Force was capable of.

I think we can stop comparing Holdo's sacrifice with Finn's attempt. There was clearly no way Finn was going to succeed and Rose knew this. That's why she said "I saved you dummy"

Those 2 scenes were NOT the same thing. If Rose hadn't saved Finn, he would have been a crispy smear at the foot of that cannon and wouldn't have stopped it at all. His ship was already melting as he approached.
Holdo, otoh, bought the Resistance actual time and destroyed several ships

-

 Galef wrote:
I think we can stop comparing Holdo's sacrifice with Finn's attempt. There was clearly no way Finn was going to succeed and Rose knew this. That's why she said "I saved you dummy"
-

That might have been the case but it really wasn't clear. Especially since she says something along the lines of winning by love not hate rather than you were going to die without saving anyone.

 Kaiyanwang wrote:

 Galef wrote:

It is also shown with Poe who fails several times in the movie by having a gung-ho attitude, then he learns from it by realizing Luke is stalling for time, rather than rushing out to help like he has done the whoel movie.

If Holdo is wrong (what I think, BTW), Poe is just treated unjustly like a child after he took out an important, dangerous, fleet-destroying spaceship.
If Holdo is right, Poe should be court martialed and possibly executed. That's a mutiny. He learns an important lesson over the blood of tens of fellow rebels, in that case. How in heaven is this supposed to be moral of the story? "Hey don't be gung-ho. You could cause the death of tens of people. Here, a slap on the wrist. Next time, cause the death of fellow freedom fighters in a smaller order of magnitude you little, adorable devil!"

The mishandling of Dameron Poe in this movie cannot be overstated.  He gets thousands (thousands!) of people killed.  That's a stupid situation to write one of your heroes into, but if you do, he needs to be a broken man after that, and hated by the survivors.  You can maybe build a redemption story from there.  He'll probably have to die heroically.  Instead, he's just sort of "aw shucks, you were right all along admiral lady!  I'm such a dummy.  I learned my lesson though and that's what really matters.  Hey!  It's BB-8!" *kneels down and greets his droid like it was a puppy*.  And the survivng rebels are totally cool with this.  "Yeah, all but 14 of us are dead and it's all your fault, but I'm glad we all learned a lesson from this".

The mishandling of Poe's character screwed up the movie on so many levels. Poe makes the same mistake 3 times over the course of the movie, with more disastrous consequences each time. First he gets Leia angry with him because he decides to defy orders and gets all the bombers wiped out by successfully continuing the attack on the dreadnought. Then he defies Holdo and sends Finn and Rose on their mission to sneak onto Snoke's ship which leads to almost every transport being blown up. Poe's mutiny is why Finn, Rose and the hacker are on Snoke's ship which leads to the FO finding out about the transports and destroying most of them. Then once they're in the mining base on Crait Poe leads the suicidal attack and outer defense that gets even more people killed. The remaining members of the resistance had no chance to fend off the FO but instead of spending time building defenses inside the mine behind the giant door Poe leads them outside where in mere minutes the majority of them are killed by the FO. The outer defenses and speeder attack serves no military purpose and is doomed to fail but Poe has to lead a suicidal defense because he's a pilot so he has to fly something even if it gets more people killed needlessly. The entire Poe story arc hammers home the point that defying orders and doing it your own way is a terrible idea.

This contrasts directly with the theme of the past doesn't matter and authority isn't necessary which is front and center during the Rey/Ren storyline. Kylo Ren is on a mission to prove that he doesn't need his Skywalker family and that he won't be trapped into a life defined by their past glories. Kylo Ren doesn't need Luke or Snoke to master his force powers and rule the galaxy. Kylo Ren wants to show the galaxy and himself that he doesn't need the past and he wants to show Rey that she doesn't either. Rey learns that her parents are nobodies and she shouldn't waste time thinking about them anymore. She also decides she doesn't need a Jedi mentor she will figure things out for herself. Is Poe's arc supposed to convince us that the choices Ren and Rey are making are doomed to lead to tragedy and death?

Prestor Jon wrote:

 Kaiyanwang wrote:

 Galef wrote:

It is also shown with Poe who fails several times in the movie by having a gung-ho attitude, then he learns from it by realizing Luke is stalling for time, rather than rushing out to help like he has done the whoel movie.

If Holdo is wrong (what I think, BTW), Poe is just treated unjustly like a child after he took out an important, dangerous, fleet-destroying spaceship.
If Holdo is right, Poe should be court martialed and possibly executed. That's a mutiny. He learns an important lesson over the blood of tens of fellow rebels, in that case. How in heaven is this supposed to be moral of the story? "Hey don't be gung-ho. You could cause the death of tens of people. Here, a slap on the wrist. Next time, cause the death of fellow freedom fighters in a smaller order of magnitude you little, adorable devil!"

The mishandling of Dameron Poe in this movie cannot be overstated.  He gets thousands (thousands!) of people killed.  That's a stupid situation to write one of your heroes into, but if you do, he needs to be a broken man after that, and hated by the survivors.  You can maybe build a redemption story from there.  He'll probably have to die heroically.  Instead, he's just sort of "aw shucks, you were right all along admiral lady!  I'm such a dummy.  I learned my lesson though and that's what really matters.  Hey!  It's BB-8!" *kneels down and greets his droid like it was a puppy*.  And the survivng rebels are totally cool with this.  "Yeah, all but 14 of us are dead and it's all your fault, but I'm glad we all learned a lesson from this".

The mishandling of Poe's character screwed up the movie on so many levels. Poe makes the same mistake 3 times over the course of the movie, with more disastrous consequences each time. First he gets Leia angry with him because he decides to defy orders and gets all the bombers wiped out by successfully continuing the attack on the dreadnought. Then he defies Holdo and sends Finn and Rose on their mission to sneak onto Snoke's ship which leads to almost every transport being blown up. Poe's mutiny is why Finn, Rose and the hacker are on Snoke's ship which leads to the FO finding out about the transports and destroying most of them. Then once they're in the mining base on Crait Poe leads the suicidal attack and outer defense that gets even more people killed. The remaining members of the resistance had no chance to fend off the FO but instead of spending time building defenses inside the mine behind the giant door Poe leads them outside where in mere minutes the majority of them are killed by the FO. The outer defenses and speeder attack serves no military purpose and is doomed to fail but Poe has to lead a suicidal defense because he's a pilot so he has to fly something even if it gets more people killed needlessly. The entire Poe story arc hammers home the point that defying orders and doing it your own way is a terrible idea.

This contrasts directly with the theme of the past doesn't matter and authority isn't necessary which is front and center during the Rey/Ren storyline. Kylo Ren is on a mission to prove that he doesn't need his Skywalker family and that he won't be trapped into a life defined by their past glories. Kylo Ren doesn't need Luke or Snoke to master his force powers and rule the galaxy. Kylo Ren wants to show the galaxy and himself that he doesn't need the past and he wants to show Rey that she doesn't either. Rey learns that her parents are nobodies and she shouldn't waste time thinking about them anymore. She also decides she doesn't need a Jedi mentor she will figure things out for herself. Is Poe's arc supposed to convince us that the choices Ren and Rey are making are doomed to lead to tragedy and death?

I honesty believe only a psychopath could write Poe like that.
But we are talking about people that wrote characters that considered a success to free ponies for 5 minutes leaving behind child slaves. That scene, too, was supposed to "send a message".