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wonderfulworldofmichaelford · 7 years ago

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The Last Jedi: What I Disliked About One of the Most Fascinating Films Ever Made

The Last Jedi is probably one of the most controversial films ever made for a lot of reasons. This movie did a LOT of shit, a lot of shit that would piss people off. Hell, it even pissed ME off. But when I see people on the internet frothing at the mouth and calling this movie the worst shit pile to ever exist, the most offensive thing Star Wars has ever produced, and threatening the director with death and calling him a soulless piece of shit bastard… I’m pretty inclined to defend the movie. Frankly, anyone who reacts THIS negatively to TLJ is an utter braindead moron; you do realize you can dislike a film without being completely, insanely hyperbolic, yeah? Again, there’s a lot I hate in this movie too, and I’m gonna talk about it shortly, but in a franchise with Jar-Jar, the holiday special, and vast swaths of the Legends continuity, is this seriously the worst this franchise has had to offer? If you answer anything other than “No,” congratulations, I’d say you’re about the same mental capacity as people who think Watto is some sort of offensive Jewish caricature.

But as much as I would love to spend an entire post insulting all the whiny bastards in the Star Wars fandom, I have more pressing matters: criticizing stuff in The Last Jedi. And boy do I have a lot to criticize. I actually did review the movie a while back, and while I stand by my initial thoughts, I gotta go into more detail about what I didn’t like. However, before continuing, I want to make one thing absolutely clear:

I think The Last Jedi is a genuinely good movie. Maybe not GREAT per se, as I have more criticisms for it than just about any other film in the series, but excellence is just so wholly ingrained into the DNA of Star Wars theatrical films that even at their most divisive they still have some level of charm. And at any rate, this movie is a hell of a lot more interesting than Rogue One. I’d say out of the newer films, this one sits behind Solo. Anyway, let’s get on to the main event… here are all my issues with The Last Jedi, presented alphabetically, and with lots of spoilers:

Canto Bright: This is probably the most annoying waste of time in the entire film, a blatant and obnoxious stretch of padding the runtime. Nothing that happens in the entirety of this subplot is truly important in the grand scheme of things; the only relevant bit of plot is that they find DJ, and this could have been done a lot quicker. This wouldn’t be so bad if they had made Canto Bright a bit more interesting, but it just feels like another attempt to rehash Mos Eisley’s cantina. It also doesn’t help this part of the film has blatant, unsubtle moralizing and cuts away from far more interesting plotlines that get much less development, particularly Rey training with Luke.

Ditching Kylo’s Motivation: In The Force Awakens, Kylo was motivated by a sort of misaimed admiration for his grandfather, where he viewed Vader as someone to emulate and who he looked to as he struggled between the light side and the dark side. All of this helped make him rather intriguing, as well as making him a very intentional Darth Vader clone character; his whole purpose was to emulate Vader, after all. All of this is ditched close to the start of The Last Jedi, and the Kylo in this film feels almost entirely different to the one seen previously. While I did like Kylo Ren a lot more in this movie, I wish they didn’t completely rewrite his character and ditch everything established in favor of what they did. It could have easily been worked into how he acted in the film.

Finn’s Diminished Importance: After being something of the star of the last film, complete with a noticeable character arc and a lot of focus, Finn kinda gets shafted here, relegated to a shitty, unnecessary sideplot that leads the heroes nowhere. It just seems really weird, though I’m not unhappy Rey got more focus and was fleshed out better.

Holdo: While I tend to view people who write her off as “The purple-haired feminist bitch” or “Captain SJW” as inferior human beings – and they are, seriously, if you unrironically say shit like this you’re a drooling nincompoop – I really can’t deny in the slightest that Holdo was written rather poorly. She really is a poor excuse for a captain, openly lying to her underlings and keeping things secret when explaining the plan would have effected nothing except her entire crew’s compliance. It almost feels like this plot was written so we’d be on Poe’s side, but it works a bit too well by making Holdo far too arrogant, stupid, and haughty to really get behind. If not for her awesome heroic sacrifice (one that might not have been needed in the first place if she’d been more honest but hey) I’d probably list her as one of the worst Star Wars characters ever… but a heroic sacrifice of this magnitude, no matter how unearned it may seem, never fails to impress me.

Killing Snoke: I can kinda see what they were going for, seeing as Palpatine as well was killed with very little revealed about him in The Last Jedi… but we have now had several years worth of canonical prequel material to flesh him out, and it’s honestly pretty stupid to assume you can pull off the same trick in a franchise twice and expect it to go off as well. Snoke was unflinchingly cool, creepy, and badass, so his bisection comes across as a waste of a truly intriguing villain. That there may be prequels detailing who he was do little to ease the sting of Andy Serkis being built up as the big bad only to be cut down. At least in Black Panther he got more substantial screentime; here, he’s s till cool, but it just feels like there is so much more he could have been.

Luke’s Attempted Murder: While overall I loved Luke’s characterization in this film and how it tied excellently into the theme of not deifying your heroes due to the trouble that can cause, it’s hard for me to rationalize Luke’s attempted murder of his own nephew, leading to Kylo Ren’s turn to the dark side. While Luke has always been a bit impulsive, this man believed he could redeem Darth Vader, AND DID SO. Need I remind you what Anakin did to those younglings? And yet his own nephew, he won’t give him the benefit of the doubt. Yes, he did stop himself, but the very fact he went in there lightsaber ready to cut down the child of his sister and his best friend just feels really jarring and out of place, even within his more cynical characterization.

Phasma: Phasma has come across as a forced Boba Fett replacement since The Force Awakens, to the point where in both films she has appeared in she has been completely and utterly outshined by mooks – Nines (AKA TR-8R) in TFA and the Praetorian Guard in this one. Despite her getting a ton of fascinating backstory and depth in canonical supplementary material, literally none of that is ever showcased even slightly in this film, and after a short, underwhelming fight scene, she apparently falls to her death. Sure, she COULD have survived, but this still feels like a rather big waste of the character. For someone they hyped up so much, the way she is handled really feels undignified.

Rey’s Parents: I’m not gonna lie, this reveal is stupid in and of itself, but the stupider thing is that a lot of people seem to be taking it at face value. When was it collectively decided we should trust the creepy, evil Sith lord who has made it perfectly clear he wants control over Rey? Why are we taking Kylo’s word that Rey’s parents were drunks who sold their kids as FACT? Honestly it just seems like a further ploy to manipulate her more than anything.

Reylo: While it isn’t canon as of yet, this movie really hammers in a bunch of hints for the obnoxiously popular ship between heroine Rey and antagonist Kylo Ren. And, quite frankly, I absolutely fucking hate this ship, but probably for a lot different reasons than most people. Do I think it’s shipping abuse? No, I don’t think it’s that any more than I think any other hero-villain ship is. Do I think Kylo doesn’t deserve to be redeemed by Rey? That’s not it either; the entire premise of this franchise is that any person can be redeemed. Kylo Ren is really no exception, though considering he killed my favorite character I’d be happy to see his ass beat. No, I hate it because I just absolutely hate the trope, if it even is one, of the hero redeeming the villain through romantic love. I feel like it would cheapen Rey’s character, and just turn the entire new trilogy into an overly long romantic drama. All the heavy-handed hints towards this pairing is just gag worthy, and frankly I’m going to be annoyed if they ruin both of these characters by going through with it.

Rose: Rose is without a doubt in my mind the worst character in the entire franchise. This seems like a rather tall order considering her competition, but consider this: her biggest contributions to the plot are the Canto Bright plotline, the absolute worst part of the film… and stopping Finn from performing a badass heroic sacrifice that might have saved the heroes a lot of trouble, delivering the stupidest line in Star Wars history, kissing Finn, and fainting. She’s just utterly pointless to the point she feels like someone’s OC from a fanfic where they get with Finn was slipped into the script.

Wasting DJ: So you get Benicio Del Toro, and you put him in your movie. Great so far, good. He does some weird accent and makes the character have a quirky personality, still good. You give him a very morally ambiguous personality and show the shades of grey in this idealistic universe that leans towards black vs. white most of the time, excellent, awesome! AND THEN… he betrays the heroes and vanishes from the film. What. DJ didn’t die, and he could come back… but he just feels shoehorned in and just doesn’t really reach his full potential whatsoever. He was such an interesting idea, and they just did the bare minimum with him.

Despite all of this crap, though… The Last Jedi still manages to be awesome. Holdo’s final sacrifice, the Kylo Ren and Rey fight against the Praetorian Guards, Yoda’s surprise appearance, Luke’s final battle… Hell, I even liked seeing Leia finally use the Force by flying through space with it; as cheesy as it is, it left me floored when I saw it in theaters. Then, of course, there’s that epic opening space battle… there’s just a lot to love here. In particular, my favorite moment is probably Luke becoming one with the Force. Maybe it’s not my MOST favorite moment, but it just feels so poignant and important, with his final moments mirroring the start of his journey, as he gazes into twin suns one last time before joining his teachers and father. It just… it gets to you, you know? I may have a LOT of issues with this movie, and a lot of stuff I didn’t really like in it, but more than any other movie I have so many issues with, I like and even RESPECT this film. You can say a lot of things about this movie, but one thing you can’t say is that it’s dull. It sparks discussion, and debate, and obnoxiously hyperbolic worst-everism. At the end of the day, whether it’s good or bad doesn’t really matter. The only thing that matters is that this film just… IS. And one way or another people will have something to say about it. Just don’t be a hyperbolic douche about it and try and enjoy things, you know?

#Star Wars #The Last Jedi #TLJ #CineMike #movies #sci-fi

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