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Regarding the "retcon":

Before these movies its never been officially established that genetic lineage relates to force aptitude or strength.

Starkiller in the force unleashed games was the most raw powerful force user but had no finese. He could drag a star destroyer out of the sky but couldnt lift up and then gently place a x wing.

Luke, for example, isn't powerful with the force. He isnt particularly good at anything. His big thing in the movies is his convictions. That he almost turns to the darkside when they threaten leia and then takes a step back and doesnt. Hes not the strongest force user. He doesnt have great finese. He isnt creative in force usage. He mostly gets confused by visions. And hes not the best with a lightsaber. And hes the direct descendent of "the chosen one".

Lineage never meant anything before and its not doing sw any favors by having it mean something now. Now people more or less have to be tied to blood lines. Thats not great.

 Lance845 wrote:
Before these movies its never been officially established that genetic lineage relates to force aptitude or strength.

Starkiller in the force unleashed games was the most raw powerful force user but had no finese. He could drag a star destroyer out of the sky but couldnt lift up and then gently place a x wing.

Luke, for example, isn't powerful with the force. He isnt particularly good at anything. His big thing in the movies is his convictions. That he almost turns to the darkside when they threaten leia and then takes a step back and doesnt. Hes not the strongest force user. He doesnt have great finese. He isnt creative in force usage. He mostly gets confused by visions. And hes not the best with a lightsaber. And hes the direct descendent of "the chosen one".

Lineage never meant anything before and its not doing sw any favors by having it mean something now. Now people more or less have to be tied to blood lines. Thats not great.

Do they?

What's Obi-Wan's lineage? Or Qui-Gon Jinn's? Or Mace Windu's? Or any of the other jedi we see on screen? What's Palpatine's lineage? We know his master was Darth Plaguis and that's about it.

Now it's clear from Obi-Wan's speech to Luke all the way back in ANH that Force abilities can be inherited, in Luke's case via his father Anakin. But AT NO POINT ANYWHERE is it said that genetic heritage is the ONLY way to have force powers. Indeed, the Jedi Order's monastic ways strongly imply they are NOT, in the majority, inherited.

After all, celibacy is a very poor way to preserve desired genetic inheritances...

And yet, "it's in your blood" is a line in this movie. And all the people who were pissed that Rey was powerful "for no reason" are now content with the explanation.

Yeah, the bloodlines thing i think is a mistake. Bloodlines should have never had anything to do with it.

 Lance845 wrote:
Before these movies its never been officially established that genetic lineage relates to force aptitude or strength.

This still hasn't been established, its pure fan conjecture, and its wrong.There are direct quotes from George Lucas saying that literally anyone can learn to use the Force, just that some people have a more natural aptitude/talent for it than others. There are also quotes from George Lucas and others saying that Midichlorians aren't necessarily an accurate measure of ones Force aptitude, just the bureaucratic metric that the soulless Jedi Order of the Prequel era had adopted as a means of screening "applicants", and that at best Midichlorians are more of a measure of "potential" (i.e. a person with a higher midichlorian count *could* be a more powerful force wielder than one with a lower count, but if the individual with the lower midichlorian count trains harder than the midichlorian count is irrelevant). Given that midichlorians are directly tied to an individuals blood, it makes sense that certain bloodlines would have higher (average?) midichlorian counts than others, but that doesn't automatically make those people the only ones that matter, nor does it automatically make them Force-Gods.

 Vulcan wrote:

 Lance845 wrote:
Before these movies its never been officially established that genetic lineage relates to force aptitude or strength.

Starkiller in the force unleashed games was the most raw powerful force user but had no finese. He could drag a star destroyer out of the sky but couldnt lift up and then gently place a x wing.

Luke, for example, isn't powerful with the force. He isnt particularly good at anything. His big thing in the movies is his convictions. That he almost turns to the darkside when they threaten leia and then takes a step back and doesnt. Hes not the strongest force user. He doesnt have great finese. He isnt creative in force usage. He mostly gets confused by visions. And hes not the best with a lightsaber. And hes the direct descendent of "the chosen one".

Lineage never meant anything before and its not doing sw any favors by having it mean something now. Now people more or less have to be tied to blood lines. Thats not great.

Do they?

What's Obi-Wan's lineage? Or Qui-Gon Jinn's? Or Mace Windu's? Or any of the other jedi we see on screen? What's Palpatine's lineage? We know his master was Darth Plaguis and that's about it.

Now it's clear from Obi-Wan's speech to Luke all the way back in ANH that Force abilities can be inherited, in Luke's case via his father Anakin. But AT NO POINT ANYWHERE is it said that genetic heritage is the ONLY way to have force powers. Indeed, the Jedi Order's monastic ways strongly imply they are NOT, in the majority, inherited.

After all, celibacy is a very poor way to preserve desired genetic inheritances...

Well, two things

Jedi aren't required to be celibate. They're not allowed attachments. They can screw around, have daily orgies and dump kids off in an orphanarium as much as they like, as long as they don't care about the other people involved beyond getting their rocks off. [Because mocking dehumanizing codes by keeping to the exact letter of them is amusing and displays the contempt they deserve]

More importantly, it isn't the inheritance of generic off the shelf force powers that anyone cares about. Its the plot ability 'chosen one' gibberish inheritance that people are annoyed by. Sure Joe Rando can be Joe Rando Jedi, but if you want to change the galaxy, fulfill prophecies and generally get a lead role in a story you need to have the Lineage background or you're just pushing brooms around. That you're only even allowed a choice if Destiny breeds true is a depressing message


@chaosxomega- what George Lucas says outside a film doesn't have much weight (even less these days). Its like Rowling declaring character's sexuality in a twitter post. If a theory isn't actually meaningful (or indeed, even exist) in the stories presented, it doesn't matter at all.
That the stories present Lineage characters as the only ones that matter, on the other hand, carries a lot of weight.

I'm always surprised at how much people talk about a prophecy that didn't even make sense in the context of the movies it was written in. We've spent decades at this point trying to make the story fit the prophecy at this point and it just doesn't.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Frazzled wrote:

chaos0xomega wrote:

Spoiler:

Given that this film establishes that Force ghosts are able to directly interact with and manipulate physical reality (which I believe is a first), I don't really see any reason why force ghost anakin couldn't have just shown up and killed Palpatine directly. More interesting though, would have been if while Rey is blocking Sidious force lightning the ghosts of Jedi past show up and use some sort of ghostly force power to destroy Palpatine once and for all or something, would have avoided the confusion that many seem to have with how Rey killed Palpatine without being possessed by him like he claimed she would be if she had executed him (this is more a problem with the audience than the movie IMO, as I dont believe Rey actually attacks him or strikes him, rather its his own Sith lightning which is reflected back at him by Reys defense which proves to be his undoing).

That would have been a cool ending.

I thought it was pretty clear how Palpatine died. Obvious callback to how he should have died in Ep3 had Anakin not.. whatever happened there.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Manchu wrote:
I don’t know how you conclude that it’s “better than good” and then describe some of the major flaws (lack of consequences, rushed pacing, pointless plot elements, ineffective reveals) that make it way, way less than good.

Usual disclaimer: I don’t begrudge anyone enjoying a product. If you have a good time watching a movie, that’s great.

90% of my issues are in the last 30 min or so. There's also a lot of moments I quite enjoyed. That's the problem with criticism. It's easy to turn it into a scale of "bad things listed equals bad" but there's a lot more going on than that. If I had to put a number on things; 3/5 is good, 4/5 is great. It's better than good, but I wouldn't call it great. To a lot of people, that's bad, but I think that's a pretty binary way to view things.

Even if you reduce the prophecy to being meaningless (and I personally like that interpretation) the rest of the writing for TROS and the ST in general is still awful, just less so.

So just saw the movie, over all IMHO it;'s the best of the sequal trilogy (TFA being too derivitive and TLJ being obsessed with subverting tropes "cause I don't understand what people want from SW!")
over all I enjoyed it.

I am not saying that powerful force users MUST have a force powerful lineage, just that "it running in the family" was established way back in ROTJ when Luke revealed the Leia was his sister. 16 years before we were told that Jedi were sorta/maybe celibate. So for a full generation the established canon heavily implied the force is inherited.

We also know that dear sweet baby yoda is strong in the force, suggesting that all of his species is as well. Ergo, strength in the force is genetic.
The Prequels were what canonized force sensitivity to not be genetic. Remember midichorians?

All I'm saying is:


-

Rey has had zero "darkness" in her until this movie, had this been teased from the start.... fair one, it was not, this is just JJ trying to clean up Rians utter mess of a movie, JJ appears to have tried to do his best and this crap is what we got, is what it is.

Disney has utterly failed with the star wars franchise at this point and I can see why they are pulling back somewhat from the movies.

No. If Rey was noone and lineage doesnt matter then rey is just a character that says the universe is open and anyone can be great/the hero. When Rey has lineage it shrinks the universe back down to the couple familys and thats boring as feth.

Just saw this tonight. I'm not going to write a long review because it's already been summed up adequately by these two quotes:

 Ahtman wrote:
Overall it was ok I suppose but also one of those films where after you see it the more things bug you.

Mostly because as Manchu accurately said:

 Manchu wrote:
Every time anything potentially dramatic happens it is almost immediately reversed. Nothing has any consequence.

I left thinking it was OK, but picked at it afterward in a bad way. It was OK, but certainly not great, and besides the above complaint, I think it was pretty predictable.

 Formosa wrote:
Rey has had zero "darkness" in her until this movie, had this been teased from the start.... fair one, it was not, this is just JJ trying to clean up Rians utter mess of a movie

Maybe I saw a different Episode 8 than you did, but in the one I saw, Rey went right for the darkness on the island, enough to panic Luke. I mean, it was a fairly major plot point that I recall.

Of course, I'm arguing Star Wars in a thread with people who will apparently watch several different hour-long reviews of movies they don't plan to see, so really, more the fool am I, ultimately.

 Formosa wrote:
Rey has had zero "darkness" in her until this movie, had this been teased from the start.... fair one, it was not, this is just JJ trying to clean up Rians utter mess of a movie, JJ appears to have tried to do his best and this crap is what we got, is what it is.

Disney has utterly failed with the star wars franchise at this point and I can see why they are pulling back somewhat from the movies.

Um, what? In both TFA and TLJ Rey is hinted at tapping into the dark side.
In TFA, she goes all "Luke from RotJ beating down Vader" on Kylo. And in TLJ, Luke chastises her for immediately going to the dark side in her first lesson.

Did we see different movies?

Oh, and I've never understood the "shrinking universe" nonsense. Star Wars is a modern mythology. The vast majority of mythology heroes have special origins. Hercules, Perseus and others are all part god. Heck, even King Arthur didn't turn out to be some nobody.
And these particular movies are SUPPOSED to be about a set group of people and how their actions affect the galaxy. To continue THAT story, it makes sense for it to be the children of characters past.
The EU was full of Skywalker offspring, afterall.

Now certainly NEW stories need to introduce unrelated characters to expand the mythos, but those will be different stories. Rise of Skywalker is the culmination of a particular story. For Rey to be a nobody, it needed to NOT be Ep VII VIII IX, but instead be some new storyline that was unrelated

-

Maybe I saw a different Episode 8 than you did, but in the one I saw, Rey went right for the darkness on the island, enough to panic Luke. I mean, it was a fairly major plot point that I recall.

nope, you saw a disjointed mess that attempted to convey that feeling but ultimately failed to do so and the only thing it succeeded in conveying was the confusion of the characters oh and bitterness from "Luke", Rey never expressed any "darkness" at all, this is just a retcon to add depth to a character with none.

 Formosa wrote:

nope, you saw a disjointed mess that attempted to convey that feeling but ultimately failed to do so...

I suspect that's what you saw, but not what Ouze saw. It's certainly not what I saw. The movies have been fairly blatant from the start about Rey courting the darkness. It may not have conveyed it in a way that worked for you personally, but it was there.

Saw it a second time this time looking for answers to some of the reviews/videos people are complaining about. Shadviersity for example (whose channel I love) and about 3/4 of the things he listed are dumb are answered in the movie. There are things that are so subtle, its literally a single line of dialog or a single shot to answer it.

Unfortunately it had to be this way, as the run time was already long and there was 2 goals to the movie, fixing ep 8 and concluding the trilogy, and by extent the Heptalogy.

I think a lot of the reviews especially on youtube with people gaking all over it are just trying to drive clicks/revenue. Negativity is going to drive traffic more than liking it.

Thank the Force the internet wasn't around in 1977-83, I don't think Star Wars would even exist as the reviews would have been so bad they would have never made a 2nd movie.

I can hear it now: Episode 4- that was so dumb, How does Luke make that shot, he has never even flown a starship until this point. Why does Obi Won disappear and suddenly "die" at will. Why can a moon size lazer destroy a planet....blah blah blah

Ep V: vader is lukes dad. That is so dumb. Han got turned into an ice cube. Why does every story have to have a love trianlge. Leia kissed luke and han, gross. blah blah blah

Ep Vi: Teddy bears defeat the empire?! Leia kissed her brother yuk. blab blab blab, so dumb, blab blab.

All the star wars movies have issues, there Sci Fi heroes journey mythos stories. They are trying to be Citizen Kane, or Casablanca, or Shawshank Redemption. Enjoy it for what it IS, not what it isnt.

 Galef wrote:

 Formosa wrote:
Rey has had zero "darkness" in her until this movie, had this been teased from the start.... fair one, it was not, this is just JJ trying to clean up Rians utter mess of a movie, JJ appears to have tried to do his best and this crap is what we got, is what it is.

Disney has utterly failed with the star wars franchise at this point and I can see why they are pulling back somewhat from the movies.

Um, what? In both TFA and TLJ Rey is hinted at tapping into the dark side.
In TFA, she goes all "Luke from RotJ beating down Vader" on Kylo. And in TLJ, Luke chastises her for immediately going to the dark side in her first lesson.

Did we see different movies?

Oh, and I've never understood the "shrinking universe" nonsense. Star Wars is a modern mythology. The vast majority of mythology heroes have special origins. Hercules, Perseus and others are all part god. Heck, even King Arthur didn't turn out to be some nobody.
And these particular movies are SUPPOSED to be about a set group of people and how their actions affect the galaxy. To continue THAT story, it makes sense for it to be the children of characters past.
The EU was full of Skywalker offspring, afterall.
-

Yeah, but we don't subscribe to the divine right of kings anymore. Its actually considered rather abhorrent by modern moral standards. So 'King Arthur did it' and 'he wasn't some nobody' is a condemnation, a statement that characters who aren't nobility are non-people.
That isn't a defense, that's just reiterating the idea that normal people can't be significant and can't achieve great things.

Voss wrote:

 Galef wrote:

 Formosa wrote:
Rey has had zero "darkness" in her until this movie, had this been teased from the start.... fair one, it was not, this is just JJ trying to clean up Rians utter mess of a movie, JJ appears to have tried to do his best and this crap is what we got, is what it is.

Disney has utterly failed with the star wars franchise at this point and I can see why they are pulling back somewhat from the movies.

Um, what? In both TFA and TLJ Rey is hinted at tapping into the dark side.
In TFA, she goes all "Luke from RotJ beating down Vader" on Kylo. And in TLJ, Luke chastises her for immediately going to the dark side in her first lesson.

Did we see different movies?

Oh, and I've never understood the "shrinking universe" nonsense. Star Wars is a modern mythology. The vast majority of mythology heroes have special origins. Hercules, Perseus and others are all part god. Heck, even King Arthur didn't turn out to be some nobody.
And these particular movies are SUPPOSED to be about a set group of people and how their actions affect the galaxy. To continue THAT story, it makes sense for it to be the children of characters past.
The EU was full of Skywalker offspring, afterall.
-

Yeah, but we don't subscribe to the divine right of kings anymore. Its actually considered rather abhorrent by modern moral standards. So 'King Arthur did it' and 'he wasn't some nobody' is a condemnation, a statement that characters who aren't nobility are non-people.
That isn't a defense, that's just reiterating the idea that normal people can't be significant and can't achieve great things.

Jesus, how often does this have to be said.

Depiction. Is. Not. The. Same. As. Endorsement.

This is a story. A fiction. And a particular type of fiction at that, one that relies on certain tropes and themes, one that is ostensibly continuing a story that is explicitly based on those tropes and themes. The idea that a story that doesn't even pretend to have anything to do with the real world even has to be "defended", let alone that people could start reaching for words like "abhorrent" is sheer, unmitigated, unadulterated farce.

 Dynas wrote:
Saw it a second time this time looking for answers to some of the reviews/videos people are complaining about. Shadviersity for example (whose channel I love) and about 3/4 of the things he listed are dumb are answered in the movie. There are things that are so subtle, its literally a single line of dialog or a single shot to answer it.

Unfortunately it had to be this way, as the run time was already long and there was 2 goals to the movie, fixing ep 8 and concluding the trilogy, and by extent the Heptalogy.

I think a lot of the reviews especially on youtube with people gaking all over it are just trying to drive clicks/revenue. Negativity is going to drive traffic more than liking it.

Thank the Force the internet wasn't around in 1977-83, I don't think Star Wars would even exist as the reviews would have been so bad they would have never made a 2nd movie.

I can hear it now: Episode 4- that was so dumb, How does Luke make that shot, he has never even flown a starship until this point. Why does Obi Won disappear and suddenly "die" at will. Why can a moon size lazer destroy a planet....blah blah blah

Ep V: vader is lukes dad. That is so dumb. Han got turned into an ice cube. Why does every story have to have a love trianlge. Leia kissed luke and han, gross. blah blah blah

Ep Vi: Teddy bears defeat the empire?! Leia kissed her brother yuk. blab blab blab, so dumb, blab blab.

All the star wars movies have issues, there Sci Fi heroes journey mythos stories. They are trying to be Citizen Kane, or Casablanca, or Shawshank Redemption. Enjoy it for what it IS, not what it isnt.

And this guff is just tired revisionist guff. The reason the originals didn't get savaged like the sequels isn't that they somehow got an easy ride because the internet didn't exist, it's because they were better films.

One clickbait merchant being over the top in their dislike doesn't negate the actual issues a lot of people have with the new films, and your hypothetical historical version doesn't do that either(not least because a lot of them are just as nonsense as Shad's - for example ANH makes it explicit to the viewer in the dialogue that Luke is a competent pilot prior to joining the Rebels and that he only "makes the shot" by tapping into the Force).

Either argue the points people have actually raised or just admit that you can't, rather than inventing your own strawmen.

 Yodhrin wrote:

Voss wrote:

 Galef wrote:

 Formosa wrote:
Rey has had zero "darkness" in her until this movie, had this been teased from the start.... fair one, it was not, this is just JJ trying to clean up Rians utter mess of a movie, JJ appears to have tried to do his best and this crap is what we got, is what it is.

Disney has utterly failed with the star wars franchise at this point and I can see why they are pulling back somewhat from the movies.

Um, what? In both TFA and TLJ Rey is hinted at tapping into the dark side.
In TFA, she goes all "Luke from RotJ beating down Vader" on Kylo. And in TLJ, Luke chastises her for immediately going to the dark side in her first lesson.

Did we see different movies?

Oh, and I've never understood the "shrinking universe" nonsense. Star Wars is a modern mythology. The vast majority of mythology heroes have special origins. Hercules, Perseus and others are all part god. Heck, even King Arthur didn't turn out to be some nobody.
And these particular movies are SUPPOSED to be about a set group of people and how their actions affect the galaxy. To continue THAT story, it makes sense for it to be the children of characters past.
The EU was full of Skywalker offspring, afterall.
-

Yeah, but we don't subscribe to the divine right of kings anymore. Its actually considered rather abhorrent by modern moral standards. So 'King Arthur did it' and 'he wasn't some nobody' is a condemnation, a statement that characters who aren't nobility are non-people.
That isn't a defense, that's just reiterating the idea that normal people can't be significant and can't achieve great things.

Jesus, how often does this have to be said.

Depiction. Is. Not. The. Same. As. Endorsement.

This is a story. A fiction. And a particular type of fiction at that, one that relies on certain tropes and themes, one that is ostensibly continuing a story that is explicitly based on those tropes and themes. The idea that a story that doesn't even pretend to have anything to do with the real world even has to be "defended", let alone that people could start reaching for words like "abhorrent" is sheer, unmitigated, unadulterated farce.

 Dynas wrote:
Saw it a second time this time looking for answers to some of the reviews/videos people are complaining about. Shadviersity for example (whose channel I love) and about 3/4 of the things he listed are dumb are answered in the movie. There are things that are so subtle, its literally a single line of dialog or a single shot to answer it.

Unfortunately it had to be this way, as the run time was already long and there was 2 goals to the movie, fixing ep 8 and concluding the trilogy, and by extent the Heptalogy.

I think a lot of the reviews especially on youtube with people gaking all over it are just trying to drive clicks/revenue. Negativity is going to drive traffic more than liking it.

Thank the Force the internet wasn't around in 1977-83, I don't think Star Wars would even exist as the reviews would have been so bad they would have never made a 2nd movie.

I can hear it now: Episode 4- that was so dumb, How does Luke make that shot, he has never even flown a starship until this point. Why does Obi Won disappear and suddenly "die" at will. Why can a moon size lazer destroy a planet....blah blah blah

Ep V: vader is lukes dad. That is so dumb. Han got turned into an ice cube. Why does every story have to have a love trianlge. Leia kissed luke and han, gross. blah blah blah

Ep Vi: Teddy bears defeat the empire?! Leia kissed her brother yuk. blab blab blab, so dumb, blab blab.

All the star wars movies have issues, there Sci Fi heroes journey mythos stories. They are trying to be Citizen Kane, or Casablanca, or Shawshank Redemption. Enjoy it for what it IS, not what it isnt.

And this guff is just tired revisionist guff. The reason the originals didn't get savaged like the sequels isn't that they somehow got an easy ride because the internet didn't exist, it's because they were better films.

One clickbait merchant being over the top in their dislike doesn't negate the actual issues a lot of people have with the new films, and your hypothetical historical version doesn't do that either(not least because a lot of them are just as nonsense as Shad's - for example ANH makes it explicit to the viewer in the dialogue that Luke is a competent pilot prior to joining the Rebels and that he only "makes the shot" by tapping into the Force).

Either argue the points people have actually raised or just admit that you can't, rather than inventing your own strawmen.

Original review of The Empire Strikes back were mixed at best. Today its considered by many to be the best film of the series and its in the Top 20 IMDB movies of ALL Time. People like to gak on other peoples work because it somehow makes them feel better about themselves. Here are some of the original reviews of ESB:

https://www.starwars.com/news/critical-opinion-the-empire-strikes-back-original-reviews

Voss wrote:
Yeah, but we don't subscribe to the divine right of kings anymore. Its actually considered rather abhorrent by modern moral standards. So 'King Arthur did it' and 'he wasn't some nobody' is a condemnation, a statement that characters who aren't nobility are non-people.
That isn't a defense, that's just reiterating the idea that normal people can't be significant and can't achieve great things.

That's a fair and valid point....for a story trying to convey that message.
Star Wars, however, has never done so. In fact, for consistency sake, Rey HAD to be a somebody for a specific reason other than "because the force chose her".
Luke was special because he has Anakin's son (then later reveal to be Vader's). Anakin was special because he was the chosen one (and you shouldn't has 2 chosen ONES)

So Rey being retconned to be {spoiler} fits perfectly with established story telling within Star Wars. Which again, follows much older story telling tropes that are supposed to be timeless, regardless our societal views on "birth rites".
Remember too that Leia was not originally meant to be Luke's sister, but the retconned that in RotJ. This is why I feel RoS feels like a Star Wars movie.
Because it follows the story telling pattern of the last 2 trilogies. You might even say it "rhymes"

-

RoS does feel like a SW movie. But it doesn't need Rey to have lineage to do that. A New Hope "Feels" like a SW movie and Luke wasn't related to any other major figure in that movie until the reveal that Vader (And THAT isn't significant until expanded universe stuff lays out the chosen one crap and the prequels get made) was Anakin at the end of the next movie.(A retcon that the actor portraying Vader didn't even know until he saw the movie in theaters).

The chosen one prophecy doesn't come up. The lineage doesn't mater. Lukes just some dude. Obiwan is the important person in ANH and not because he is some great and powerful destined person but instead because he has a history that Leia's father told Leia about and he gets called in to help because of his experience. Luke is just an apprentice he takes on because Obi is old.

Again, Rey was more interesting when she was nobody. That she was older like Luke, but full of fear and desperation because she was abandoned and alone... Thats all you need for her push towards the dark side. Any other layering of lineage and destiny just takes away from it. Now it's not HER that is pulled towards the darkside. It's her blood line. Now shes not powerful because anyone could be powerful. She is powerful because of where mommy or daddy came from.

Is Anakin actually the chosen one? Is there even a chosen one? Does the prophecy even happen? Honestly at no point did I find Anakin more interesting because of some prophecy. Its one of the more eye rolling threads of the prequels, in no small part because the prophecy is way too vague to given any real meaning to any of the events of the series.

In some ways, this need to explain Anakin's power is as ruinous to the Jedi as it is to the films. To that end, the exact same could be said for Rey.

I am going to tell you a little secret. All these things you're discussing... nobody at Disney or Lucasfilms or whatever ever thought about them. The new trilogy isn't a story, it's not even movies. It's a series of scenes that some algorithm determined would resonate with the average viewer that were arranged in vaguely chronological order but really have no causality. Nobody is relatable because nothing the feel or do matters, they are just teleported from scene to scene and things happen at random until the bad guy dies.

 lord_blackfang wrote:
It's a series of scenes that some algorithm determined would resonate with the average viewer

Almost everything wrong with this movie is the same kinds of problems we saw in "Totally Not Wrath of Khan I Swear"

 Lance845 wrote:
But it doesn't need Rey to have lineage to do that.

I would argue that.

Without any special lineage, how does Rey keep pulling new powers out of her nether regions with ZERO training, ZERO guidance, and ZERO experience?

Being of the lineage she's from gives her an excuse to do so. Granted, it's a pretty darn limp excuse, but an excuse nonetheless. With NO excuse you're just trampling all over two trilogies worth of precedent where even the Chosen One needed training to do much of anything with the Force.

I'm fine with the Force choosing its champions. It doesn't need to follow logic. That was always the point until it got codified for videogame logic.

 Vulcan wrote:

 Lance845 wrote:
But it doesn't need Rey to have lineage to do that.

I would argue that.

Without any special lineage, how does Rey keep pulling new powers out of her nether regions with ZERO training, ZERO guidance, and ZERO experience?

Being of the lineage she's from gives her an excuse to do so. Granted, it's a pretty darn limp excuse, but an excuse nonetheless. With NO excuse you're just trampling all over two trilogies worth of precedent where even the Chosen One needed training to do much of anything with the Force.

Bingo.

-

 Vulcan wrote:

 Lance845 wrote:
But it doesn't need Rey to have lineage to do that.

I would argue that.

Without any special lineage, how does Rey keep pulling new powers out of her nether regions with ZERO training, ZERO guidance, and ZERO experience?

Being of the lineage she's from gives her an excuse to do so. Granted, it's a pretty darn limp excuse, but an excuse nonetheless. With NO excuse you're just trampling all over two trilogies worth of precedent where even the Chosen One needed training to do much of anything with the Force.

1) Lets just put the prequels in the trash where they belong. But first, you're wrong, Anakin did a lot with the force, like Pod Race and win. Or fly a ship into a droid mothership and destroy it. Anakin force uses all over the place constantly.

2) The movies tell you. The force balances itself. When a great darkness rises, the light rises to meet it. Plus, Rey exists in a world where stories of Luke and the Jedi resurface as positives and everyone is telling them. She knows about General Lando, and Princess Leia, and General Solo and Luke Skywalker. Which means she hears stories about the force. If the light rises to meet the dark and she is just throwing gak at the wall to see what sticks then thats what she does.

3) Again, Luke does a bunch of gak in the moment when he needs to without much or any training. He hit those wamp rats with his T-16 despite seasoned fighters calling it impossible. He spends a week tops on the Falcon as his only training getting shot by a ball droid but manages to sink the torpedo into the Deathstar. Before he meets yoda he learns how to force pull his lightsaber into his hand. Who taught him that? Everyone in starwars always does gak for no good reason.

When Anakin is randomly the only human capable of podracing, no one said, "how can he do that without any training!" only to be placated by the "chosen one" nonsense later in the film. We all went "ooo, its cause he's strong in the Force" because no one had these fits until Rey.