This characterization of Luke, " Ditching Leia and Han. Leaving the rebellion," is set up in The Force Awakens, not The Last Jedi. Rian Johnson was just working with what was handed to him.

A lot of things people blame TLJ for are actually the fault of TFA, but people don't seem to realize it because that movie was superficially fun and moved at a fast enough pace people didn't notice all the flawed story and character beats it established. TFA just set up a lot of horrible "mystery boxes" and got out before resolving any of them, leaving TLJ to pick up its mess and try and fix it. Then TRoS came along to show JJ. Abrams really doesn't know how to resolve a story in a satisfying way.

Omg I completely forgot about Keri Russel! My goodness that was a mess of a movie. The 3PO stuff, the video game "find and object to move on" style of storytelling.

The PT was a mess but it was George Lucas telling his story. The ST is film makers doing everything they can to thumb their noses at his story. It will not be viewed the same 20 years from now.

But TLJ made us watch that Canto Bight nonsense and made Luke a grumpy, blue-milk-drinking asshole... it didn't HAVE to go down that road, regardelss of how TFA set things up.

At first I thought you were just being coy, but you basically described Star Wars: Legacy.

Cade Skywalker is a male legacy offspring, 130+ years in the future. His ancestry is not explained much. He's a scoundrel and scofflaw, trying to ignore and escape the Jedi training of his youth.

What I find humorous is this trope everyone claims to hate in Rise of Skywalker, but completely ignore it in Rogue One (which arguably might be a worse example of video game writing). Climb this tower for this box, take box over there. Run across battlefield to push a button, climb different tower to activate this other thing...yada yada yada. Overall the film is good, but it seems to get a pass for the video gamey third act for some reason.

Good points, the concept of each of the sequels starring just one of the original trilogy was flawed from the start. Vs literally just having TFA be that film, while introducing new characters going forward. And when Carrie died, everything blew up.

But I will say, TLJ is still a very flawed film and especially as a 2nd act in the trilogy. They could've set up Luke's isolation as a necessity to keep some big thing from happening, and could've opened up other plot points vs closing them.

I'm not sure if having each film heavily feature one of the big three of the old cast was necessarily planned. I think Harrison Ford only signed on if his character was killed off in the first new film, so he'd stop being asked about if he would do more Star Wars, and JJ wanted to make the hunt for Luke the McGuffins for the first film. Carrie still had a decent role in the first two films, so it was never just exclusively one cast member per film.

That doesn't make sense though. First, TFA clearly sets up the reasoning for Luke's leaving, due to the destruction of his Jedi school and the deaths of nearly all his pupils due to one of his students turning to the Dark Side. So TFA is just a natural progression of that. And if Luke was fighting some bigger threat, why not contact friends and family? What's an actual plausible scenario for him coincidentally finding a reason why he has to stay isolated, against his will, after he initially runs off and isolates himself for the reason given in TFA?

It did open up plot points. Mainly, it opened up Kylo Ren as being the main villain, and the idea that Rey would have to fight him instead of redeem him. Instead, we got Vader 2.0, down to the repeated redemption arc. It also opened up Poe taking on a leadership roles after learning some lessons about being a leader. And Finn could've dealt with his feelings for both Rey and Rose. There's possibilities there, but JJ resorted to the easy outs, if not outright retcons, to make a uninspired ROTJ knockoff in the final film.

It was assumed Luke isolated himself as a direct result of the destruction of the school. It could have been something else. And it was. The real reason for his isolation was how was tempted to kill Ben to prevent as yet unrealized tragedies. His momentary lapse led Ben to attack Luke and then the destruction of school to occur as a result. However, TLJ ignored the Knights of Ren who were name dropped in TFA and briefly shown to be the ones responsible for the slaughter in the school. Then again, they were super lame in TRoS, so perhaps that was for the best.

However, back to Luke's self imposed exile, though I am fine with the reason given (it was nice to see it being something personal rather than for epic reasons), it is nonetheless surprising that Luke's exile wasn't due to something bigger. Like the rumored ancient evil, that could have tied into Ben's corruption.

In any case, I think we'd be collectively more accepting of the flaws if they stuck to the ST ending with the rise of Kylo Ren, leading into the next trilogy with elevated stakes due to an already victorious villain. Oh and none of the Rey Palpatine/Skywalker BS.

Funny enough, Rey was meant to be Obi-Wan Kenobi's granddaughter. That's why you hear Ewan McGregor as Obi-Wan saying "these are your first steps," when Rey grabs Luke's lightsaber for the first time. No clue why JJ Abrams decided to ignore that in favor of Grandpa Palpatine.

As for Poe, he was meant to die early in TFA, right when he and Finn crashed on Jakku. Oscar Isaac pleaded to keep the character alive. Given there was no plan for the character, I like what Johnson was able to do with him in terms of his arc. However, I hated the silly coup subplot since all would have been avoided without Holdo needlessly keeping a known wild card in the dark. Had there been an actual traitor, it would have made sense to keep her plans secret.

That's right, daring to question the purple hair lady who acted like a crazy person was the lesson. Meanwhile he and Finn could have had a 2nd act that actually made sense and continued an obvious brotherhood that was established in the TFA. But my biggest issue with The Last Jedi? It should have been summed up in the opening crawl - "the resistance has fled their base of operations and gathered forces on the crystal planet" and move the plot forward from there. Instead, we got a 2.5 hr movie about that, brilliant.

Fair point about TFA actually setting the Luke stuff up. But, TLJ milked it, no pun intended, and it got old fast. By the middle of the film he should have been back in the game per se. It’s crystal clear that the Abrams to Johnson back to Abrams thing was a complete disaster.

Ugh. Canto Bight. Animal rights activism shoved into Star Wars. And the stupid Fathiers didn’t even get away. The entire Canto Bight subplot with Rose and Finn should have been deleted. Poor Finn. I really liked his character in TFA and was so bummed what they did with him.

Rpgue One is just such a better made film in all regards that the video game end sequence is actually cool because I gave a crap about the outcome. During Rise I kept wondering how much longer I could endure this nonsense. Rogue One is infinitely better than any sequel movie, IMO.

Right. Luke did have reasons to be upset. He was lied to and Yoda & Ben basically tried to get him to kill his own dad. The Jedi counsel really fucked up during the prequels too although some of that was the Siths ability to render their force powers weak. But, Last Jedi just unfolded horribly. Just doesn’t work.

I will admit that Laura Dern all purpled up was sort of sexy. . However, her character and that whole set of scenes was weird. The hyper space smash was cool though.

What we got with Last Jedi was basically a 2.5 hour version of Battlestar Galacticas Episode called #33 if anyone is into that show. They kept having to jump from the cylons. It was the same thing almost. .

And not a single competent First Order leader. Once it was clear the resistance fleet couldn't/wouldn't jump again all that was necessary was to bring in additional Star Destroyers in front of them. What the First Order was out of ships?

And #33 was a great episode.

Yep and yep. Bad planning, I guess.

I like TLJ as a Star Wars movie just fine. It's like B- Star Wars; competent enough, save for the entirety of the Canto Bight sequence, which was dopey.

It just shouldn't have been the middle film of a new trilogy, doing little to advance the overall trilogy story (which we all know, there wasn't one), except for arbitrarily killing off Luke. It was like a two-hour episode of a Disney+ show.

Aren't most Disney+ Star Wars shows two-hour movies expanded into series form?

How much did The Empire Strikes Back advance the story? When you look at it plot-wise, it's just Han & crew trying (and failing) to get captured by The Empire, and Luke training with Yoda. Any actual advancement is all in character development, which is the same as with TLJ.

All good stories are rooted in emotion. So much of the wrong kind of online criticism (and I'm not saying Hokeyboy is part of this, but the conversation between you two reminded me of so much discourse I see on lesser social media) focuses on lore and plot, trying to use some form of quantifiable objectivity to measure success in films, rather than treating them as works of art that may or may not connect with each individual for a variety of reasons. Theme, lighting, editing, production design, costuming, mise en scene, internal character motivations/emotions, music/score, all get thrown to the wayside because "it didn't advance the plot (or at least not in a way I liked)" or "the dialogue was cringe".

Then of course when it's a director they feel indulges their "Totem Pole of Cinematic Importance", they state the most obvious shit in the world, "y'know the 3 crosses in the background and the way Lois is holding him is an allegory for Christ". Like wow thanks, I was asleep during the last 10 fucking reels the director put on screen, so I missed the anvil he dropped on my head.

This thread/conversation kind of sums up why this franchise is, in my opinion, dead in the water. It means so many different things to so many different people. No matter what Disney puts out, it's going to disappoint someone. And by someone, I mean some non-negligible portion of the fan base. And because Star Wars has such an outsized importance to the people who care about it (for now), those who are disappointed will certainly let it be known. It's such a small needle to thread that I don't think Disney can possibly win.

I think you're right, at least when it comes to anything that ties too closely to the Skywalker saga and its associated characters. However, I think you can look to Andor for something that works, as it was a success with both critics and fans. There were two keys IMO:

• It's a mature, high quality show with good writing and direction
• It almost completely leaves out anything related to the Skywalker saga characters, Jedi knights, the Force, etc, while still taking place firmly in the Star Wars universe and introducing viewers to other interesting pockets of that universe

If you only hint at or make vague references to the things for which people carry such strong and varied expectations, while making something really good about previously-unseen characters and places, you can make an excellent, successful, and widely-appealing Star Wars movie again.

I guess when I said the franchise (and when I say "the franchise" I'm specifically talking new stuff) was DOA, I meant as a giant giant cultural touchstone. Does Andor "matter" in a cultural sense? Serious question. I don't actually know the answer. But from where I sit, it feels like it's just a part of the endless streaming content churn, despite it's quality. The first season of Mandalorian definitely hit big, so I suppose it's still possible for new Start Wars to make a mark, but even that seems to have lost much of its initial luster. We'll see when the movie hits, but maybe that will be a big deal.

For what it's worth, I wasn't talking about any kind of cultural importance. I was responding to his sentiment:
"No matter what Disney puts out, it's going to disappoint someone. And by someone, I mean some non-negligible portion of the fan base."

I think "Star Wars" will still be a cultural touchstone, but similar to Star Trek, it's going to evoke the entire franchise more and more, instead of a particular movie, movie trilogy, or TV series.

Even aside from the questions about quality, just the fact that Disney is releasing so much Star Wars content is going to dilute it somewhat, which was inevitable as soon as Disney bought it. It was no longer the domain of one person, making new movies in the series as he felt like it, but an IP to be exploited.

Also, Star Wars isn't the standout sci-fi/fantasy series anymore. There's been a lot more competing brands that have arose since Star Wars first came out, like LOTR, Harry Potter, the MCU, etc. If you want a big-budget effects-heavy spectacle with a story spanning several films, you have a lot of choices nowadays.

Ultimately, like with Star Trek, it may be that Star Wars works better as a series of TV shows than as a persistent and strong movie franchise, constantly cranking new films out. Which isn't a bad thing, but I think Disney was really hoping to make Star Wars the next MCU, but something about the universe, or maybe its fans, chafe against it. I think it may be because Star Wars was so limited and insular compared to Marvel comics. Marvel had hundreds of characters spread out over dozens of comic book titles over decades to mine for movies. Star Wars, even the EU, often focused on Luke and Co. , with only a few offshoots that maybe feel even more niche. Plus, per the title, there's so much emphasis on a war or battles, as opposed to exploring the universe at large under other lenses. It'd be like if the James Bond movies were focused solely on WWII era espionage, instead of constantly-updating globe-hopping adventure. They're exploring some fringes of those Star Wars, like the aftermath with a not completely defeated opponent on the edges of the galaxy, or the espionage and more grounded rebellion right before the first films, but it's limited in how much it's explored outside that framework.

Fair, but I think there are a lot of Star Wars fans out there that while maybe not disappointed in Andor, probably just shrug their shoulders at it the same way they shrug their shoulders at some random EU novel. In other words, it's just a thing for a much smaller subset of the fandom that will consume everything and doesn't matter much in the grand scheme of things.

ha! that's cool... I might actually check it out now!

I think to some extent that’s the case for all of the Disney+ TV series, at least in comparison to movies. That said, on Rotten Tomatoes, Andor S1 has 5,000+ user ratings and The Mandalorian S3 - an established show that drew lots of attention from Star Wars fans and ended its previous season with a Skywalker tie-in - has 2,500+ user ratings. In terms of movies, Rogue One was essentially the same formula as Andor that I described and it has 100,000+ user ratings vs. 50,000+ for The Rise of Skywalker. My point is, there’s a template for doing Star Wars content that expands the universe and manages to satisfy a large portion of the fan base.

I'll admit I'm bringing a lot of my own baggage to the conversation. Like many children of the 80's, Star Wars was my entry point into movies. Return of the Jedi is the first movie I can remember seeing in a theater. To this day Empire is my favorite movie of all time. And I could not care less about any of this stuff. The franchise has been so watered down that none of it means anything to me anymore. And it's not that I hate it or anything. I just don't care. I watched the first couple of episodes of Andor and I thought "this is pretty good", but then I never bothered to finish it because when all is said and done, there are a thousand other things I'd rather do/watch.