#in defense of the last jedi

[sjbattleangel]

Like Shaun here, I believe The Last Jedi is THE best Star Wars film right alongside The Empire Strikes Back. As Shaun defends the film. he even goes on to tackle its most common nitpicks ("Luke was out of character", "the Canto Blight sequence was pointless", ect), all whilst noticing its striking similarities with The Empire Strikes Back.

I recommend watching this video wholeheartedly.

[short-wooloo]

I feel like people miss the point of the "war is bad" message

What it's supposed to mean is that war is terrible, it's destructive, it ruins lives, it leaves scars, and you should only partake in it when there are no other options, because even if you win, even if you survive, you will not be the same, which is why the phrase used to be more commonly known as "war is hell"

But "war is bad" seems to have been construed by people in fandom into "any fighting is bad, if you fight you're morally terrible and impure, you should not fight at all, no matter what", this is annoying in fandom, as it often misses the point fiction is trying to make, but what's worrisome is when people apply this to real life, as I have seen people do regarding russia's invasion of Ukraine

And that's almost never the point of "War is Bad" works

Works like Lord of the Rings, Avatar The Last Airbender, Transformers, The Clone Wars, Halo (especially Reach), etc all have themes on how horrible war is, but they categorically do not say it is wrong to fight, what they say is usually along the lines of "war is terrible, and what makes it so terrible is that we have no choice but to fight, it would be ideal if we didn't have to fight at all, but we must fight, because not fighting is not an option, because not fighting, not opposing tyranny, conquest, and evil only allows those things to exist unimpeded"

[sjbattleangel]

Hot take

[david-talks-sw]

Luke Skywalker in 'The Last Jedi' (1/2)

Luke in The Last Jedi... love it or hate it, it's a difficult subject.

I personally stand somewhere in the middle. I don't think Luke was "ruined"... I'd argue that, from a purely in-universe perspective, his subplot actually tracks with what was previously established in the original films.

There are issues, but I think they are mainly found on an out-of-universe/structural level (which I'll get into in post 2/2). For now, let's take a deep dive and unpack why this portrayal isn't all that problematic.

The most commonly-heard argument is that:

"They ruined Luke's character! He would never go into exile or abandon his sister and friends!"

Simply put, Luke used to be:

an optimist

so brave he'd risk his life to save his friends,

aspired to become a Jedi.

Whereas, in The Last Jedi, he's:

jaded and depressed,

hides/abandons his sister and friends, like a coward,

says the Jedi need to die?!

Now the fact is... Luke is 24 years older when he goes into exile, 30 years older in The Last Jedi. People change, with age.

In Luke's case, he matured from an impatient kid who'd rashly run to save his friends, like in Empire Strikes Back, to a grown-up who makes hard choices and restrains himself from doing that, even though he desperately wants to.

Luke tells himself this is a self-sacrifice, this is for the greater good.

"Because he’s the last Jedi and a symbol of that it then becomes this self-sacrifice, he has take himself out of it, when he knows his friends are dying, when the thing he’d most like to do is get back in the fight." - Rian Johnson, The Empire Film Podcast, 2018

And Rian Johnson didn't want Luke to come across as a coward, so he also gave Luke an argument that initially seems to make sense:

The Jedi way is flawed and inevitably leads to arrogance. Proof: the Sith originally came from Jedi. His own new order is no exception to that rule, even if he thought it was (in his arrogance, he believed his own legend).

So if he leaves and stays in exile? No more Jedi, no more Jedi-turned-darksiders that can mess up the galaxy.

The Force will keep trying to balance itself and a new, worthier source will appear (in the form of Rey).

But while his reasoning that "the Jedi are inevitably arrogant" seems sound and reasonable... it's wrong.

Just like Dooku's reasoning that "the Jedi are corrupt" seems sound, but is ultimately wrong.

Just like Anakin's rationalization that "the Jedi are evil" seems sound nope, that one doesn't even seem sound, it's just plain wrong.

Where is it wrong, in Luke's case?

Well, he's rationalizing his actions by blaming the Jedi religion, instead of admitting his own failure.

"The notion of, 'Nope, toss this all away and find something new,' is not really a valid choice, I think. Ultimately, Luke's exile and his justifications for it are all covering over his guilt over Kylo." - Rian Johnson, The Art of The Last Jedi, 2017

"In his own way, [Luke is] trying to disconnect, he’s trying to throw away the past, he’s saying 'Let’s kill [the Jedi] religion. It’s the thing that’s messing us up, thins thing right here, let’s kill it.’ And the truth is, it’s a personal failure. It’s not religion, it’s his own human nature that’s betrayed him." - Rian Johnson, The Empire Film Podcast, 2018

He fucked up, plain and simple.

But it's not because “he’s a Jedi and that made him arrogant and the Jedi mentality is flawed”, as he claims early on in the movie.

He failed because he's flawed. Luke is human and had a moment of weakness where he was scared shitless and acted on instinct.

Yoda's spirit helps him realize this, and he fixes his mistake by allowing Leia and the resistance to save themselves. And as he does it, he acknowledges the importance of the Jedi and their teachings.

And it's also why, in The Rise of Skywalker, he has the maturity to admit that he wasn't staying on the island out of some self-sacrificial gesture, as he kept telling himself. Truth is, he was afraid. Afraid he'd screw up again.

Do the movies go about this in an emotionally-satisfying way? That's debatable. But, on paper, I don't think Luke's behavior in The Last Jedi is too much of a shark-jump considering how

THE ORIGINAL IDEA CAME FROM GEORGE LUCAS!

In the couple of months after the Disney sale, Lucas developed the Sequels with Michael Arndt in late 2012/early 2013, and concept art was made by artists like Christian Alzmann.

Note: the image on the left got a “Fabouloso” stamp of approval from Lucas!

Lucas’ sequels would feature a Luke Skywalker who was a figure like the jaded, reclusive Colonel Kurtz in the movie Apocalypse Now (which, fun fact, Lucas helped write and was originally set to direct).

The reason why Luke was in self-imposed exile wasn’t specified, all we know is that he was:

hiding from the world in a cave,

haunted by the betrayal of one of his students,

and spiritually in a dark place.

Other concept artists, like James Clyne, tried to illustrate the First Jedi Temple and some of the designs were approved by Lucas, such as the one below.

Eventually, Kira the female Jedi-wannabe protagonist (who eventually became Rey) would seek him out so he can train her.

This Luke would be a much more prominent part of Episode VII (instead of only appearing at the end) but still died at the end of Episode VIII.

For sources and more information about George Lucas’ plans for the Sequel Trilogy, read this post.

The only part that wasn't detailed by Lucas were the specifics of why he went into exile. But all in all, this sounds pretty similar to what we got in The Last Jedi.

"Luke would never try to kill Ben!”

I agree. And he didn’t try to kill Ben. He stopped himself.

And this version of the event?

This didn’t happen.

What Kylo tells Rey is his version of the story. And he thinks he’s telling the truth... but his recollection of the event is warped as this was obviously a very traumatic event for him.

"I don't think he's lying actually. In my mind, that was his experience. [...] I think that it's probably twisted a little bit by Kylo's own anger and his own prejudices against Luke, but I feel like he's actually telling her the truth of his experience." - Rian Johnson, Star Wars: The Last Jedi commentary, 2017

The narrative frames the third version of the story as the one that’s objectively how events went down. Because Rey believes him, and Rey is both the protagonist and a stand-in for the audience.

Now, if you think Luke’s word is unreliable and you have an easier time trusting Kylo’s version of the story, go to town.

But I think that if you actually believe would Luke would never try to kill Ben, you’d take Luke's second retelling of the story at face value.

I know I do.

“Okay, but he would never consider killing a child, like Ben. He saw the good in Darth Vader!”

First off, Luke refers to Ben as "a scared boy" because, he's a middle-aged man. But objectively, Ben was 23 years old.

But also, I mean... with Vader, Luke actually had the luxury ignorance.

Do you think would have truly gone on that Second Death Star if he had actually witnessed Vader:

choke his Padmé,

kill Obi-Wan,

actively try to kill Ahsoka,

murder Jedi younglings,

betray and hunt down his other Jedi brothers and sisters,

and cold-bloodedly kill countless innocents, one by one?

There’s a difference between watching him kill Ben Kenobi (who still ‘lived’ as a ghost and talked to him seconds later) and hearing a couple of rebel pilots get blasted in the trench run, and actually seeing all the horrors he’s committed.

Don't get me wrong, Luke knows Vader is evil, absolutely. But if he had seen this side of Vader, the needlessly cruel side...

... I'm not sure he'd have been as compassionate.

Proof: Obi-Wan, someone who deeply loved Anakin (to the point where he could never bring himself to kill him), someone that genuinely wishes that Luke can redeem him... also feels that, realistically, attempting to do so would be pointless.

And hell, even without really seeing all the massacres Vader committed, the second the latter threatened his sister, Luke went berserk and almost killed him!

So the question becomes:

“What could make Luke - trained Jedi Master, long-time optimist and overall compassionate to a fault - consider killing Ben?”

All we’re told is that he looked into Ben’s mind and saw darkness and the destruction, pain, death, and the end of everything he loves.

The specifics are left to our imagination. They could include:

the sight of Kylo slaughtering his parents and Chewie with a smile on his blood-smeared face,

the smell of Han's burning flesh in the air,

the wails of Chewbacca as he's run through by Kylo,

the faint sound of Leia's tears hitting the ground,

the destruction of the New Republic's citizens and planets.

Whatever it may have been, it was intense. Because Force-induced visions are vivid as hell, as has been shown throughout the franchise.

It's not like watching something on a TV, you're there, all your senses are affected in an extremely powerful way.

And the vision Luke experienced scared him so much that even shortly after it, when looking at a sleeping young man, all he sees is that evil monster from the vision. So he tremblingly draws his saber.

But it's evident that Luke wasn't thinking clearly or rationally.

His base emotions had taken the wheel, he was being tempted by the Dark Side.

"He doesn’t give in to the Dark Side, it’s a moment of temptation to the Dark Side. It reminds me very much of when Vader is tempting Luke, when Luke is underneath the stairs in [Return of the] Jedi, lit with that very beautiful half-and-half, the duality of these two sides of him being pulled. And that’s really what that moment is for me, it’s a moment of temptation to the Dark Side for Luke." - Rian Johnson, IGN, 2017

And yet despite seeing all that... Luke catches himself.

It's not the first time that Luke almost does something horrible to a family member and catches himself. Again, 24 years prior, he almost murdered his own father in a fit of rage.

The scene in Ben's hut intentionally parallels that outburst he has in Return of the Jedi.

A terrible future is presented before Luke.

He reacts instinctively, is tempted by the Dark Side.

He snaps out of it.

Even the angle and framing of the shot is designed to match:

"Some of these parallels are just “it’s a close-up of the same character” but this one was very intentional. It’s why I had him look down at his mechanical hand holding the saber." - Rian Johnson, Twitter, 2019

The only real difference is that, in Return of the Jedi, Luke only comes to his senses after a frenzied onslaught during which he actively tried to kill his own Dad.

24 years later, despite having witnessed that terrible future even more vividly than he did on the Second Death Star, he catches himself merely seconds later. Instead of going on a whole rampage, he stops the moment the lightsaber turns on.

I'd call that "progress".

"But Luke should've learned his lesson and known better than to give in to the Dark Side!"

Resisting the temptation of the Dark Side is by no means a one-and-done thing. It's not a power-up that you get, it's a constant struggle.

"I think it disrespects the character of Luke by treating him not as a true mythic hero overcoming recurring wounds & flaws, but as a video game character who has achieved a binary, permanent power-up." - Rian Johnson, Twitter, 2019

Dave Filoni says so too.

"In the end, it’s about fundamentally becoming selfless, moreso than selfish. It seems so simple, but it’s so hard to do. And when you’re tempted by the dark side, you don’t overcome it once in life and then you’re good. It’s a constant." - Dave Filoni, Rebels Remembered, 2019

Hell, even George Lucas stated something along those lines:

"The Sith practice the dark side and are way out of balance. The Jedi aren’t as much out of balance because they’re the light side of the Force. They still have the bad side of the Force in them, but they keep it in check. It’s always there, so it can always erupt if you let your guard down." - George Lucas, The Star Wars Archives: 1999-2005, 2020

Learning the lesson once doesn't mean you've learned it forever. Especially with the Dark Side, which poses a never-ending battle.

In-universe examples: Anakin learned to let go of his attachments during the “Padawan Lost” arc of TCW.

A year and a half later, he’s butchering kids because he can’t let go of his attachments.

And during wartime, Yoda found himself repressing his darker instincts and ignoring their existence. Thus, when he had to face them, he struggled to acknowledge and control them.

So considering Luke didn't go "rampage mode" with Ben, as he did when he tried to kill Vader, I think he deserves some credit.

Finally, I've heard this insane argument many times, as a response to the above points:

"Yeah but Luke wasn't actually trying to kill Vader! He was holding back, he was trying to keep him alive!"

And, uh... no. He wasn't.

He lost his shit, folks. And almost killed Vader.

Like, right here?

⬆️ If Vader hadn’t moved his saber to intercept Luke’s blade, Luke would’ve stabbed Vader in the face.

⬆️ If Vader hadn’t held his sword up in time, SWISH, there goes the top of his helmet AT LEAST, if not the rest of his head.

⬆️ If Vader hadn’t dodged he’d be chopped in two.

⬆️ If Vader’s arm gave out slightly sooner, if his blade faltered just a little lower, if he loosened his grip on his saber a bit, Vader would be cleaved in two.

My point is that if you swing at someone with a lightsaber? They’ll get chopped. And if you aim for the head or the chest? You’re trying to kill them.

Before Luke got a grip, throughout that whole rampage, the only thing that kept Vader alive was his own skill.

Otherwise, Luke would’ve murdered him in a fit of rage.

If Luke was holding back, then the theme of "resisting the Dark Side" completely falls apart.

There's no indication that he was restraining himself, in he script.

And just look at the imagery.

Luke is surrounded by darkness, symbolizing how he's being seduced by the Dark Side, he's being tempted to give in to his anger towards the man who hurt his friends and took his hand.

Then Vader threatens Leia.

And the next time we see Luke, he's silhouetted, his face is all black.

Luke was originally trying to hold back and talk Vader down, but fails to control his instincts and gives in to fear, to anger, to the Dark Side... and goes all out.

He swings at his father furiously and keeps swinging, until he cuts off Vader's hand... and he is about to deliver the final blow…

… when he sees Vader’s mechanical hand and realizes that by giving in to his anger, that path will inevitably lead him to become exactly like this half-machine half-man laying at his feet. That’s where the path to power leads.

And so he makes a decision:

He’s a Jedi. Like his father before him. His compassion for Anakin is stronger than his hate for Vader.

That's the narrative intent.

It has to be.

Because if he had been "holding back" throughout that entire bit, then the stakes are lowered immeasurably, John Williams' saddening score is misplaced, the lightsaber choreography is misleading, etc.

For the above-listed reasons, I think Luke's portrayal in The Last Jedi doesn't really contradict anything in the previously-established lore. It works, it's the typical "old cowboy needs to get back in the saddle" trope. Frankly, I can defend this subject all day long... so where's the problem?

The problem comes in at an out-of-universe level. While it's not inconsistent... it's also not satisfying.

The thing is, if you...

... take one of the most brave and optimistic characters in the franchise, then open the film saying "well, now he's jaded and in hiding", without giving us context on how he became that way...

... take a character whose arc was specifically about controlling his emotions, then show him be ruled by those emotions without providing context for what made him do that...

... then that kills the suspension of disbelief, for a lot of fans.

And, as such, they'll have a much harder time going along with what you're saying.

Because "show, don't tell" is one of the most basic principles in visual storytelling. And we weren't shown:

"Ben being increasingly violent during training",

"Luke sitting Ben down and having a talk with him, only to be ignored" or

"the horrors Luke saw in Ben's head".

I have no doubt that those things happened, in-universe.

But if we're talking about a movie-going experience, many were left emotionally-unsatisfied.

Because all that stuff was in there... but only subtextually. It was up to the fans to imagine on the details. Normally, I'd argue that's what Star Wars is all about: allowing fans to dream and think outside the box. But in this specific case, I think many fans would've rather had a more complete and explicit story. Because it's Luke Skywalker.

And yet... even these structural and writing issues had a logic behind them, and if you ask me... there was no other direction that this story could be taken in.

We'll explore this in more detail in part 2/2.

[bikananjarrus]

so where my brain is at is.. well. avar is the sword and silandra is the shield. discuss

[sjbattleangel]

Also my reaction when I hear and see the very same hate tossed towards the Clone Wars and Rebels (which were and still are written off as "stupid, crappy Saturday Morning Kids' cartoons" simply because they were animated!) and the Sequels, especially The Last Jedi!

My reaction to the Star Wars Prequel haters in a nutshell:

From Batman: The Killing Joke by Alan Moore & Brian Bolland.

[artist-issues]

I can never succinctly say what I want to say in defense of The Last Jedi. It’s definitely because I have bad communication skills. But it’s also because the arguments against The Last Jedi always seem so badly founded that I don’t know where to start. Like, if you don’t understand why Poe wouldn’t be told about the escape plan, do I need to explain 3-Act Structure to you? Or should we start with foreshadowing? Did you forget the first movie when he had the map but chose to make a reckless stand against Kylo Ren instead of living to fight another day? Or is your problem that you don’t understand character flaws? I can’t decide which misunderstanding led you here, so I just ramble about them all

[themattress]

Comparing general audience rankings of the Star Wars Sequel Trilogy.

Rotten Tomatoes: 1. The Force Awakens 2. The Rise of Skywalker 3. The Last Jedi

IMDB: 1. The Force Awakens 2. The Last Jedi 3. The Rise of Skywalker

Amazon: 1. The Force Awakens 2. The Rise of Skywalker 3. The Last Jedi

Metacritic: 1. The Force Awakens 2. The Rise of Skywalker 3. The Last Jedi

Letterboxd 1. The Force Awakens 2. The Last Jedi 3. The Rise of Skywalker

Google Reviews: 1. The Rise of Skywalker 2. The Force Awakens 3. The Last Jedi

On average, it’s The Force Awakens > The Rise of Skywalker > The Last Jedi.

The Force Awakens has never once placed last.

And I’m sorry, I really do love The Force Awakens, but...

I honestly believe that the other two movies have the better material in them.

Related Note: The Rise of Skywalker has an “Audience Says” on Rotten Tomatoes now!

I wasn’t entirely unhappy with the previous sequel, yet I agree. Everyone who says it failed to stick the landing lack understanding of what Star Wars actually, objectively and literally is.

Definitely glad we have a counter-balance to this bullshit:

“A frustrating lack of imagination”. Meanwhile, over at The Force Awakens:

..........................

[themattress]

TLJ discourse from 5 years ago. Let's see here....

"It retreads the Empire-Rebel conflict". Tbh, I can't help but blame TFA for this one, since it already did that even if the Empire and Rebel positions weren't quite the same as in the Original Trilogy. The fact that we have such a familiar conflict at all is what allowed Rian Johnson to take it in the direction that he did.

Can't argue there; Rey was a waste of potential in this movie.

God yes. Finn was done so dirty.

This isn't an actual problem, though. He was still shown to be incredibly vulnerable and conflicted during that first redemption rejection and after it. Having him go through another redemption rejection where we see that he's now far more assured in his dark path made him feel like a greater threat.

Yeah, fair criticism.

Ditto.

I feel as though you're ignoring the impact that those lessons actually had on her, and also that his unintentional final lesson ended up being about the nature of failure and how you should and should not respond to it.

At least the Dyad now exists so we know what the deal is.

Um, she was already shackled to that Neo-Nazi school shooter. Their interactions in TFA made it clear there was a connection between them that would continue to grow.

See point 3 again.

Didn't we see her mourn him in TFA already?

THIS, otoh, has no justification. What the Hell, Lucasfilm?

Again, totally indefensible on Lucasfilm's part.

Poe would have still been a mess even if that scene was retained.

This doesn't bother me that much. I'm actually way more bothered by their overtly positive spin on things during the ending. This needed to be a somber, bittersweet moment, not a happy one.

Yeah, that was weird.

Informed Attributes happen; it wasn't harped on so I don't care.

Ackbar should've sacrificed his life and Holdo should've lived, IMO.

Well, Wexley came back in the next movie! And then he died.

Huh? They still interact before and after that separation, though!

It really is bizarre how much this movie deleted that it needed yet retained so much that it didn't.

They interact toward the end of the movie, though.

This legit BAFFLES me. Why did Kathleen Kennedy allow this treatment of Leia? Shouldn't she want her to have more action, to really earn that large role planned for her in Episode IX? And more importantly, to utilize Carrie Fisher to the best of her abilities while she was still around?

B-but democratization of da Force! :P

Maz was a waste in both follow-ups to TFA. It's such a shame.

This is a nitpick; sometimes telling and not showing is fine.

Another nitpick; who the Hell cares at this point?

Honestly, why were the Knights of Ren even a thing to begin with?

In this case, yes, telling and not showing wasn't fine because if Rian Johnson wanted this story to remain true then not showing it and just relying on Kylo's words came back to bite him, as did leaving out who was on the ship seen in TFA.

Absolutely. Was at least one line of dialogue giving some kind of explanation really too much to ask for?

It’s nothing. This movie is nothing. 

Rewatching The Last Jedi, it astonishes me how many opportunities the movie chose to squander. I have never seen a sequel so determined to do absolutely nothing with any of the setups or characters from a previous installment, or to remove the scenes that would carry the most emotional weight, and it’s really, really depressing to me. 

It retreads the Empire-Rebel conflict. The setup was there for a small, outmatched First Order, which had lost most of its resources with Starkiller Base, up against a mostly-intact New Republic, but I guess no one in the NR cares enough about the state of the galaxy to fight back. The NR is completely ignored and never even seen as a functioning entity, and everyone seems to use “Rebels” and “Resistance” interchangeably.

A Force-using protagonist was introduced who’s shown to be quite aggressive and reckless, potentially making her a more morally-grey character, then she turns out to be good by definition no matter what she does because she only exists to balance out the evil antagonist.

A former member of the Evil Army of Evil, who turns out to be one of the most empathetic characters in the saga, who used to be a cog in the machine, deserted them on moral grounds. You want subversion, there it is. A faceless, disposable mook became the deuteragonist. Or he was. Now he has his experiences as a child soldier played for laughs by making it seem like he was the entire First Order’s janitor instead of an capable, promising soldier who rejected them.

They had an antagonist who’d modeled himself after Darth Vader and was deliberately shown to reject redemption when offered, then the second movie is devoted to showing he’s potentially redeemable only to reiterate the same point.

There’s a journey to the first Jedi temple. Nothing is learned about the origins of the Jedi, or who the first Jedi were. The original Jedi texts are present. They are never read from. Very little information about the Jedi can be gleaned from this location, aside from what appears to be a focus on balance between the light and dark, judging from one mosaic. Luke’s criticisms of the Jedi apply to the order during the prequels, he doesn’t explain anything about how they began.

The temple has been watched over by a group of caretakers for an unknown amount of time and for unknown reasons. They appear in two scenes, both of which are comic relief, and answer next to nothing about them or their culture.

Rey’s training under Luke consists of two lessons (out of three he had promised, the third was deleted) and swinging a lightsaber around, unsupervised, for about thirty seconds.

Rey picking up the use of the Force so easily was a waste. Characters training in fiction is a great opportunity to see how they face and overcome challenges, and in the case of fantastical settings, to build up the mechanics of the world and how scifi/magical elements work. This is why Luke’s training with Yoda in ESB was so interesting. We can’t see Rey siphoning the skills from Kylo’s brain, we need to be told that’s what’s happening to explain how she got so strong so fast. The fact there’s an explanation for it doesn’t make it interesting to watch.

They didn’t even go all in with making Rey a completely independent character. If you want to contrast her with Kylo, being someone with no significant background or family vs someone born to a legacy and loving family who spat on it all, show why she’s worthier of it. Now instead of showing she’s a better heir than Kylo while having no blood relation to Luke, her interactions with him are tense at best and physically violent at worst. Instead of the expected outcome of her being important because she’s related to Luke, she’s important because the Force made her Kylo’s antithesis and dumped a bunch of power on her. Another character is still the source of her involvement in the narrative, just for a different, less-interesting reason. Instead of having the torch passed to her by her father, Rey gets shackled to a Neo-Nazi school shooter. 

They wanted to show a hero coming from an unassuming background, and did nothing with Finn, whose background is unknown, never implied to be important, and considering the FO probably doesn’t bother to keep detailed records of its child soldiers, potentially impossible to find out.

Didn’t have Leia mourn Han at all, and removed his funeral from the film despite initial plans to include it.

They deleted the scene showing Luke grieving over Han’s death.

They deleted the scene that develops Phasma by exposing her cowardice, develops Finn by letting him be the one to confront her over Starkiller’s destruction, and develops the stormtroopers by depicting them as real people with their own doubts and the potential for revolt. All that was gone in favor of “Let’s go, chrome dome”.

They deleted the scene set during the evacuation depicting Connix warning Poe that they needed more time to escape, which is what motivated him to go against the FO fleet and buy time, showing his devotion to his comrades and willingness to throw himself in danger to protect them. This is cut, and Poe is repeatedly implied to be hot-headed and glory-seeking despite his actions being based around the aforementioned motives and no alternative scenes were included, we’re just told he was being reckless despite his behavior in both movies being inconsistent with that. Poe’s actions cost the bombers, but it took out the dreadnought and saved the people on the transports.

With all the talk about the core theme of “failure”, instead of having the Resistance attack on the dreadnought fail, it succeeds. They could’ve shown the plucky, rag-tag fighters utterly fail against the First Order’s indomitable war machine, but instead, they accomplish their goal. Yeah, they lost their bombers. Costing about 50 casualties and the most incompetently-designed ships in the franchise doesn’t matter much compared to 215,000 enemy combatants and the FO’s second-largest warship getting taken out. That’s a damn good resource exchange and I don’t know how much better than a 4000:1 kill ratio Poe would need for people to stop criticizing him. It’s probably higher than that already depending on how many people went down with Starkiller Base. The attack on the first Death Star cost all but three of the fighters sent to destroy it, suffering heavy losses doesn’t make it a defeat.

With Paige dead, and the movie treating the successful destruction of the dreadnought as a disaster and entirely Poe’s fault, Rose never confronts him about how he led her sister into the battle that killed her despite interacting after Rose’s introduction focused on her grief. 

Rose is established as a mechanic, and never shown making use of those skills.

Admiral Ackbar is killed after giving him a single line anyone else could’ve delivered. Yeah, he’s liked by fans almost solely because of the “It’s a trap!” line, but that’s no reason to do absolutely nothing with him.

Jessika Pava and Temmin Wexley are just gone, apparently. They were minor characters, but they were still there, they could’ve been interesting, and now they’re gone. They’re either dead, which sucks, or they’re off with other Resistance forces elsewhere, which undermines the FO’s single-minded focus on the fleet we’re shown. A sequel should not rely on people being ambivalent to characters from previous installments to make sense.

Finn and Poe are prevented from interacting by separating them.

Rey and Finn are prevented from interacting beyond a hug, and they deleted a scene where Finn sees Rey’s parting promise to meet him again, shown to him by BB-8, who tries to comfort Finn. Like with Poe’s deleted scene, this provides context to his actions and was removed to make the character look worse, even though we can infer his motives from his development in the last movie.

Luke and Leia are prevented from interacting by putting Leia into a coma.

Leia is put into a coma so she can’t do anything else, either. When she’s finally out of the coma and calls for help from her allies across the galaxy, no one responds. Leia Organa, the last princess of Alderaan, who was present at the biggest battles of the Galactic Civil War, who led the Resistance against the galaxy’s would-be oppressor, can’t inspire anyone to action.

It’s asserted that the Jedi do not own the Force, which is a well-established aspect of the universe in many other Star Wars works. Then no new insights into it unconnected to Jedi teachings are provided. The film ends with Rey carrying on the Jedi’s legacy anyway.

Maz Kanata, a Force-sensitive non-Jedi, appears for a brief cameo and is not connected to the whole anti-Jedi bent the film’s on at all.

Both Rey and Kylo state they’ve had visions of each other’s future which inform their actions and expectations of each other. Neither are shown or described in detail. In Kylo’s case this might be understandable because he’s almost never the viewpoint character, but Rey was shown visions of herself by the Force in that cave, something could’ve been added there.

What happened to Luke’s green lightsaber? I assumed it was destroyed when that hut collapsed on him in the flashback, but I can’t find any confirmation of that. It’s the saber he constructed himself and wielded after losing his father’s, it’s relevant to his character, but it’s completely forgotten. Including by Luke himself since he Force-holograms up the old blue one.

No information is provided on the Knights of Ren and the film doesn’t even acknowledge their existence. They are presumably other students of Luke’s, but neither they nor the other Jedi-in-training they presumably killed are seen. Apparently they were considered as replacements for the Praetorian Guards, but were cut because that wouldn’t make sense and there was no room for them otherwise. Here’s a thought: if Kylo Ren is taking over the First Order from Snoke, have him fight the guards alongside the knights.

No information is provided on Rey’s parents aside from their irrelevance. If what Kylo said was true, have the guts to show the damn drunks explicitly and stick to that explanation if you’re going to do it. It also doesn’t address who was on that ship in Rey’s flashback in TFA.

No information is provided whatsoever about Snoke, including him being completely absent from the flashback scenes showing the moments before Kylo Ren destroyed the new Jedi despite his explicitly-stated relevance to Kylo’s development around that time.

It’s nothing. This movie is nothing. The problem isn’t “subverting expectations”, the movie actively doesn’t use what it’s given and then replaces potential payoffs with nothing. These are all setups provided either by The Force Awakens or The Last Jedi itself, and the movie either ignores them or cuts them out for the sake of time. It’s become a cliché criticism to bring up the milking scene, but the fact they left that in while cutting out all those deleted scenes shows how monumentally fucked up Rian Johnson’s priorities are. What really hurts is that it could’ve been great, but everything that could’ve had emotional weight and character depth was deliberately stripped out.

[short-wooloo]

@david-talks-sw recently made a post (https://www.tumblr.com/david-talks-sw/712987173655363584/luke-skywalker-in-the-last-jedi-22) about Luke in TLJ, specifically on how some ideas struggled to work due to the film being unable to delve into Luke as deeply as is ideal, and how this can be remedied through additional media

So in that spirit, here’s my Ideas for what can be done with a pre-sequels Luke and Ben series, expanding on Ben’s turn to the dark side and basing the relationship between him and Luke and the falling out off of Shifu and Tai Lung from Kung Fu Panda

(Originally this was from a reblog I made on @ensomniaa​ ‘s post on the Jedi and Oogway https://www.tumblr.com/ensomniaa/696816137236774912/the-jedi-and-master-oogway)

This would start 10 years before TFA/TLJ (thus 4 years before Ben’s turn which is 6 years before TFA/TLJ), and cover a period of time of 4 years, so the timeline is 24-28 ABY

Let’s start with Luke, in line with basing him off of Shifu, Luke has a great deal of love and pride for his nephew/student, unfortunately this is clouding his objectivity on the subject, that love and pride is becoming attachment, Luke is not seeing what his nephew is becoming/not taking the warning signs as seriously as he should, ironically Luke is attempting to learn from his past mistakes, in ESB he rushed into Bespin without thinking because of a vision, so here Luke is seeing visions of Ben falling, but he’s trying not to overreact to them and make the same mistake or worse cause what he sought to prevent, that’s good, but as I said, Luke’s attachment to Ben is clouding his judgement and he’s not taking it as seriously as he should, and of course over time these visions will become more frequent and Ben’s own behavior (we’ll get to him in a minute) will worsen, but Luke, somewhat arrogantly (ties into Rian Johnson’s commentary that Luke is conflating his own failures as failures of the Jedi as a whole, he was arrogant and it caused disaster so now he’s thinking of the Jedi as a whole as arrogant in bitterness) reassures himself that he saved Anakin so he can do the same again with Ben

Speaking of, for Ben Solo, his bloodline and abilities are a great source of pride to him, but that pride is turning to arrogance and entitlement, we would see him grow more aggressive and cocky (which Snoke/Palpatine would eagerly encourage), becoming more violent in fights and prone to un-Jedi like behaviors, while also believing himself to be the greatest by virtue of his bloodline, we also have the revelation of Anakin/Vader (this is largely taken from the eu stuff), like Luke before him, Ben idolized Anakin Skywalker and was not made aware of his identity as Darth Vader, and the reveal is crushing, again just like it was for Luke, but whereas Luke came to terms with it, Ben will not, and it makes things worse,

Now I want to take a break from Luke and Ben specifically to address some additional factors

during all of this Luke would have some outside factors making things worse (and not just Snoke/Palpatine prodding at Ben trying to make him turn), obviously we know that the correct way to go about Jedi training is one Master focusing all their efforts on one student

unfortunately, Luke can’t exactly do that

in addition to mentoring Ben, Luke is also trying to rebuild the Order, Lead it, recover artifacts, and train a few dozen other Jedi all at once

It’s the worst of both worlds, nobody/nothing is getting the proper attention needed

Now I want to be clear, this is not a criticism of Luke, this is just a fact of how things are, he’s one man with a ton to do (and also maybe this feeds into his later self loathing, Luke thinks himself responsible because he tried to do everything), ideally it should not be this way, but like with the Prequel Jedi, Luke is lacking in good options, and taking on all of that work at once is simply the least bad option

As I already said, we wouldn’t see this all at once, this would be a gradual process over the course of years, I kinda would approach this like a lot of prequel material does: that feeling of dread as we slowly approach disaster

And speaking of disaster, we set the stage, the point in time is just a few days (or hours even) before the flashback in TLJ (the year is 28 ABY, 6 years before TFA)

Luke and Ben have returned from a mission, while it was a success, Luke is concerned, his visions have gotten worse, and the reality is not much better, Ben was very aggressive and arrogant, and even killed the darksider (who maybe is another apprentice of Snoke’s and Kylo’s own predecessor in the First Order) they fought after that darksider had been defeated (why yes that is an allusion to Anakin killing Dooku), and the whole thing has Luke questioning if he’s been going about this the right way, and then Ben does it...

He is demanding to be made a Knight, and this is where we lock in Ben’s parallels with Tai Lung (and parallels to his grandfather), rather than awaiting the time as to when he is judged to be worthy of something (knighthood/the Dragon Scroll), Ben in his arrogance is demanding it of his teacher

and the rejection of it causes something to snap

In a blind rage Ben lashes out, igniting his saber and attacking Luke, the fight is brief but furious, with Luke winning soundly

(and yes, I did deliberately inject aspects of the Obi-Wan/Anakin relationship and decline into Luke and Ben’s, if Kylo Ren’s story is going to mirror Vader’s so to should his fall)

though this all seems like should be the end of it, in truth this is the beginning of the end, Luke orders Ben to return to his hut to meditate and think on his actions, in a combination of attachment to Ben and an attempt to not act rashly, Luke is not taking this situation as seriously as he should, he’s not seeing Ben as the person who gave into anger and attacked him, Luke is still seeing Ben as his nephew and student

ut now Luke is questioning everything, he fears he has made a mistake, his love for Ben is clouding his mind, and after a little while he heads for the hut Ben stays in hoping to try and resolve this

But what has happened with Ben since the fight?

Well he is mad, he’s stewing in rage, dark murderous thoughts flow freely, self control is out the window, he’s not over the edge quite yet, but its enough for Snoke/Palpatine to use to create a disaster, they cultivate these dark thoughts, amplify them, even in Ben’s dreams knowing it will just take one wrong person in the wrong place and wrong time to set everything off

And thus, as Luke enters the hut hoping to speak with Ben and resolve things, he’s hit by darkness in Ben’s mind (Snoke/Palpatine probably took care to make sure that Luke was able to see such), and those thoughts, in tandem with Ben’s growing violent behavior and the fight just a few hours earlier, Luke seriously considers the unthinkable...

And from this change in context, Luke contemplating killing his nephew as we seen in the TLJ flashback is less out of the blue and instead shows that this is the culmination of a low point in the relationship

Of course, all of this wouldn’t exactly fit in a single movie’s runtime, but it just goes to show what disney should be doing with the sequels, expanding on the context to help improve them

I had a few other ideas but they’re not really about the Luke/Ben relationship, more just ideas for “if this was a show”, stuff like ongoing plots, arcs, other characters, etc

[david-talks-sw]

Luke Skywalker in 'The Last Jedi' (2/2)

OK, so in Part 1/2 of this post, we explored why Luke's TLJ characterization isn't really inconsistent with what had previously been established in Star Wars lore. It tracks. Dare I say: it works.

And yet... something still feels off, right?

Well, the reason for this is because Luke's character development is impacted by the film's structure, which in turn is impacted by - of all things - Poe's lack of development in Episode VII! Just hear me out!

The intention: Making the audience feel the same emotions as the protagonist, deuteragonists and antagonist.

This is what most movies strive for. Unless the film is trying to go for some dramatic irony, you want your audience to be on the same page with your protagonist, emotionally-speaking.

And y'know what? Rian Johnson does this very well.

Overall, he displays a very good grasp of making us, the audience, feel the same emotions as a film’s protagonist (generally, the main character, whose POV we follow) or deuteragonist (the ‘secondary main character’).

Rey was expecting to meet the Luke from the Original Trilogy, the Luke from Legends... and instead was disappointed to meet an old jaded hermit. Just like many of the fans were.

Finn is fooled by DJ, mistaking him for an archetypal "misfit with a heart of gold". Just like the fans were.

Poe is increasingly frustrated with Holdo, just like we were.

Call it "meta", call it "subversive", the bottom line is that some of the narrative choices that a lot of fans criticize the film for are intentionally placed there to put you in the same mental state as the characters you're following, even during the film's twists.

But as a result, if a character isn’t the protagonist (Rey), or the deuteragonists (Poe or Finn), or even the antagonist (Kylo)... they'll barely get any development.

They might get one or two scenes for themselves tops, but overall secondary characters like Luke, or Holdo, or DJ will mostly be shown through the filter of Rey or Poe’s or Finn's POV.

The Problem: Luke isn't a protagonist or deuteragonist, so he isn't developed to the audience's satisfaction.

Don't get me wrong: Luke has the second-most screen time in the whole film, but that's because Rey is the one with the most screen time, and he's primarily a character in her storyline.

To be fair, he does have his own subplot, he's the spiritual center of the whole film. But concretely, he’s one step above support characters like Holdo, Leia, Rose and DJ. We're barely shown his own POV and mainly view him through Rey's lens.

Like, there's a reason why in this scene...

... we don't see what Luke witnessed in Ben’s mind, simply his reaction to it: Rey didn’t see it either.

All three "Rashomon" flashbacks are what Rey is picturing in her mind when she’s being told three different versions of the story. She doesn't see what Luke witnessed, so we don't see it either.

And you know what? On paper... this is also not really an issue. It's actually quite standard. I mean, Yoda doesn't get much backstory or an arc in Empire Strikes Back. He's just the mentor figure, and we see him through Luke's POV.

There's no arguing that Luke in TLJ receives much more development than Yoda does in ESB.

But y’know what?

Yoda was also never the protagonist of a whole other trilogy.

So if you're gonna tell an audience that "the protagonist of the previous trilogy strayed from the path and is now a completely different person" - even if they eventually make their way back with a character arc - I don’t think it’s out of order for audience members to expect more development than a regular mentor archetype.

Context is expected, and when it isn't delivered, that'll kill the suspension of disbelief, for many fans. They're not just disappointed in Luke like Rey is, they're not immersed in the movie anymore.

So how do you go for what Rian was going while also trying to keep about half the fans from jumping ship?

The Solution (?) Delving deeper into Luke.

So let’s suppose Luke was treated like a deuteragonist. Suppose we see his own POV more, rather than just seeing him through Rey’s eyes. Would that help? And what would that look like?

Firstly, we keep that deleted scene of him mourning Han’s loss.

Or we show it like in the comic adaptation of TLJ, with Luke getting angry at his decision to cut himself off from the Force, unintentionally levitating objects until Chewie consoles him.

WHAT IT DOES: Either version humanizes Luke, shows who he is beneath the jaded mask he's putting on, gives audience a chance to mourn Han with him.

We keep that deleted scene of him explaining to Rey why he thinks the Jedi were flawed, also known as the “3rd lesson scene”.

WHAT IT DOES: Spells out Luke's rationalization that the Jedi Order needs to end. Marks the beginning of Luke's wake up call.

We add one or two additional short flashbacks of Ben gradually becoming darker and unhinged. Maybe he harms one of his fellow students in a fit of rage.

WHAT IT DOES: Clarifies that Ben was going through a dark period and that's why Luke went to confront him in his hut. He didn't just saunter into Ben's hut, sabers blazing.

Maybe halfway through the film, we see Luke pack his bag as he prepares to rescue his friends with Rey, only to find her communicating with Kyloe.

After all, the novelization shows that, upon opening himself to the Force and sensing Leia, he immediately decides to get back in the game. So if that’s not just something Jason Fry added to embellish stuff, let’s see that.

WHAT IT DOES: Drives home the fact that Luke realizes his mistake. (Although, it might also take away from the subsequent scene with Yoda).

Finally, let’s actually see what Luke saw in Ben’s mind: him killing Lor San Tekka, killing Han, killing Leia, murdering Chewie and countless more innocents all with a smile on his face.

WHAT IT DOES: Provides context for Luke's extreme reaction.

Most of these things are already technically canon, the only difference is that it would be shown on screen. And if all these elements are added, then Luke’s reasons for staying away and his reaction in Ben’s hut are already more understandable.

So where’s the flaws in this solution?

Solution Flaw #1: Plot twist would be ruined.

Talking about this one:

Again, we're seeing Luke THROUGH Rey's POV, for the most part. Our reaction is - intentionally - the same reaction as Rey.

The whole point of the twist is that

we, with Rey, believe Kylo can be redeemed, because

we, like Rey, remember Luke redeemed Vader.

So when she realizes “oh shit, Luke was right, he’s too far gone”... we react that way too.

But if we had seen Ben’s turn as well, if we had seen how he was during his training, if we had seen what Luke’s saw in Ben’s mind, we would all collectively agree with Luke and think that Rey is making a mistake in trying to redeem Kylo.

So when Rey walks away from Luke, rather than hoping she succeeds, we’d just be waiting for her to inevitably fail. We'd be thinking:

"Rey, you moron, you're walking into a trap and Kylo isn't gonna turn!"

Emotionally-speaking, we would be detached from the protagonist.

Solution Flaw #2: Increase in the runtime at the cost of other scenes.

The Last Jedi is already the longest film in the franchise. Adding just three of the above-suggestions would increase that runtime, which wouldn’t work. So you’d need to take something out.

But Finn and Poe’s storylines are already stripped down to their bare bones as it is. Hell, so was the Rey/Luke storyline, for that matter.

Actually, wait... why do we have three storylines, in the first place?

After all, if we look at The Empire Strikes Back, they only have two storylines, right?

The protagonist, Luke, goes to Dagobah.

The deuteragonists, Han and Leia, evade the Empire.

Main plot & subplot. Great.

Wouldn't it be better to just have Poe and Finn do the Canto Bight storyline together? That would give us sme remaining time to focus on Luke’s past, right? Where’s the issue?

Well, Rian Johnson put it this way:

Bottom line, in The Force Awakens, Poe is a clear-cut character. Simple as that. He’s charismatic and fun, but there isn’t much room for him to grow.

A lot of people compare his character to Han, but there's an issue with that comparison (besides the obvious fact that Finn is Han and Poe is Leia)...

In ANH, Han has an arc. He's the philosophical antagonist of the film, he's only out for himself which conflicts with Luke's attempts to help others. Han goes from being a selfish irresponsible gun-slinger to taking responsibility and becoming a selfless rebel, a part of something bigger. Arc concluded.

(Hell, this very reason is why Harrison Ford didn’t wanna keep playing him and lobbied to kill him off.)

So in ESB, Leia is the one who has the arc. Han is just being himself. Leia is the one who must slowly come to terms with the fact that she does love him, despite him being a total nerf-herder. So she and Han bicker, there’s conflict there, but there’s also an underlying affection.

As such, when Poe doesn’t have an arc in TFA, and is already on great terms with Finn, then there’s no conflict if you put them together in a subplot.

And conflict is crucial, in storytelling. If it's absent, then the story becomes boring.

As a result, Rian Johnson had to create conflict and growth for Poe.

Which means that, now, a third storyline is thrown in the mix... and the pacing and development of the other two are affected by this. Some really good scenes need to be cut, some stuff needs to get shuffled around.

For example, remember this deleted scene, from further up?

In the commentary, Rian explained that the reason it wasn’t in the film is because it didn’t intercut well with the other two storylines. *Three and a half, if you wanna count Kylo's personal scenes.

As such, there’s no space to add more scenes to develop Luke's perspective.

And if Rian made more space, well, that wouldn't work either. Because while Luke is the spiritual core of the film... this isn't his movie. He's not the protagonist anymore. But he used to be, and if you show him too much (not as Rey's mentor figure, that is, but as a protagonist or deuteragonist), he'll take the spotlight off the new cast with the snap of a finger.

When Michael Arndt was working on the Sequels with George Lucas in 2012, he encountered this same issue:

“Early on I tried to write versions of the story where [Rey] is at home, her home is destroyed, and then she goes on the road and meets Luke. And then she goes and kicks the bad guy’s ass. It just never worked and I struggled with this. This was back in 2012. It just felt like every time Luke came in and entered the movie, he just took it over. Suddenly you didn’t care about your main character anymore because, ‘Oh f*ck, Luke Skywalker's here. I want to see what he’s going to do’.” - Michael Arndt, Entertainment Weekly, 2015

And I'm guessing this is a problem that JJ had to deal with too, hence why Luke was pushed to the end of Episode VII: so as to give the new characters a chance to be developed a bit more, first.

“In a very general sense, the original idea for Episode VII started midway through what we now know as Episode VIII...” - Pablo Hidalgo, Twitter, 2016

There's finally the fact that, while most of those ideas can make Luke's fall more understandable... his story isn't about "how he fell".

It's about how he got back up. The whole point of the film is that even when you've reached your lowest point you can still inspire and be inspired by hope.

So while adding any of the above scenes would only reinforce what was already shown in the movie, be it explicit or subtextual... they wouldn't ADD anything to the theme of learning from failure and getting back in the saddle.

Do I care about Luke’s characterization in TLJ...?

In spite of what the length and intricacy of these two posts might indicate... I don’t, really 😅

Like, sure, I wish more had been done with the character, but Luke was never really my childhood hero, Obi-Wan was.

So Luke in TLJ isn’t a gaping wound in my chest. I didn't whine about it in 2017, nor did I shed tears of joy and said “he’s finally back” when we saw him in The Mandalorian, for example.

Like, it was an awesome scene, but in my mind Luke never left.

Also I’m the type of Star Wars fan who’ll tolerate any addition to the canon by virtue of it being new Star Wars content.

So even if that addition is something I didn’t enjoy during the viewing, I still focus on the positive and roll with it, I come up with a headcanon that'll make it work.

Because you get to do that, with a transmedia franchise!

If you don’t like how it went down in the movie? There's always a comic around the corner that'll retcon it and/or retroactively make it better... that's how it was for the Prequels.

But for the Sequels, it's difficult. There's a scarcity of transmedia content, when it comes to stuff set around the Sequels era.

I mean, can you think of any

Luke-centric work

that serves as a meaningful addendum to what's seen of him in the Sequels?

A novel, a comic issue and a distantly-relevant manga.

That's it.

(The Mandalorian and Book of Boba Fett are too soon after ROTJ to have any meaningful impact on Luke's journey in the Sequels. Some people see Luke's behavior in those shows as "the beginning of his failure", but I covered why I don't think this is really the case, here.)

Instead of just three items, how about a comic mini-series focusing on the year Luke spent training Leia, or on his adventures across the galaxy as he tries to rebuild the Jedi Order? Maybe he meets Cal Kestis, or Quinlan Vos? Maybe he needs to face against an Oppo Rancisis who was consumed by the darkness, post-Order 66?

Or better yet, how about a video game centered on Luke, in the style of Fallen Order or Jedi Academy?

Get Mark Hamill to motion cap it, he's done it before.

This would also allow the fans who grew up with the powerhouse that is Legends Grandmaster Luke Skywaker to have some fun!

Many fans wanted to see Luke in action, in TLJ, and instead got a pretend-samurai fight. Which is nice, powerful and symbolic, he goes out like a true Jedi, it makes the Force more than a superpower... but it's not a lightsaber duel. In a game, though? Players can go to town.

I dunno... any additional content would've smoothed the blow for many people who didn't like what was done with Luke in TLJ. Sure, you'd always have people who just hated the whole thing, but if transmedia content helped reduce the hate for the Prequels, it could've done the same with Luke.

I'm not sure why that route wasn't taken.

[fhrlclln]

underneath | qimir

SUMMARY -> ever since you found him and he trained you, he had always concealed his identity to you for his unknown reasons. you were always curious what he looks like underneath the cortosis helm he wears. though, this time the curiosity in you would be sated at last when a particular sparring session turns into an unexpected lesson in trust.

qimir x acolyte!fem! reader

masterlist

GENRE -> mild nsfw/smut

WARNINGS -> unprotected p in v, sexual tension, mild violence, master/pupil dynamic & smut is at the end : P

WC -> 2.82k

a/n: surprise! another qimir fic cuz i can’t get him out of my head.

likes, comments and reposts are greatly appreciated !! <3

enjoy !!

"have you ever wondered what he looks like underneath that mask?"

you asked your fellow pupil, mae, one day out of the blue. the particular reason for asking that question had always been because of your undying curiosity for the years you started to train under him.

your masked master.

"i don't." mae would answer, saying that she doesn't care what he would look like underneath the mask. saying that as long as he trains her, his identity doesn't matter to her. you understood her with that, she was his acolyte first and it probably dawned upon you that the years of concealing his identity to her she had thrown away the curiosity of what their master looked like.

but on the other hand, you, you somehow couldn't stop wondering.

you had found him or- he had found you when you were escaping your slave captors after your own sister had betrayed you in selling you to them. you were angry, in rage and unaware of the dormant power that had awoken in you with that rage you had felt. and in your fit of rage, you had managed to slaughter two of the captors chasing you, leaving you feeling guilty for your horrendous actions. you decided to escape and flee the planet. that is until by some chance, you had come across the masked stranger in the middle of the night who had told you about the gift you possessed, telling that you shouldn't be ashamed you used it in your self-defense.

and that's when he had took you under his wing, training you as his pupil.

he had taught you what your gift was, what your power is. he trained you, taught you and for the most part, despite him putting this distance between you and mae, he had helped you. and maybe that’s why you’re so curious to know who he is really, you wanted to see the master who had graciously accepted you despite you knowing your connection with the force was not as strong as mae’s.

he was… well, you could not really put a strong opinion on what kind of a man your master was. for the most part, he was always away and in training sessions, he was closed-off and distant. but when he spars with you and mae, that’s when a hint of his personality is peeking through.

rough, aggressive, strict. the way he spared with you had left you with tired sore knees and bruised arms when defending. on the offensive attacks you made he was quick to dodge and maneuver himself with your predictable attacks. he was ruthless in his combat but there was still that fluidity in it. but you knew he still held back with you despite the aggressiveness. you wished he had put more effort in your sparring sessions just like mae’s but you knew he was focusing more on her since she was at the brink of completing her lessons.

“safe travels, mae.” you wish her luck as she nods at you. the master had given her final lesson- to kill a jedi without a weapon. you were proud of your fellow acolyte but it did upset you how much you were falling behind. the waves splash in the background as you watch her walk to her ship. you wave her off as you saw it fly out the cloudy atmosphere then jumped into hyperspace, on the course to euda.

the sea breeze helps you gather your thoughts, and you wonder if the master would train you further today. seeing that mae had to learn this lesson by herself. sensing him, you feel the pull of the force as you turn around to see your master standing a few feet away from you.

the scene makes you remember that night when you found him. for a moment it did frighten you to see him loom over you when you fell to your knees from running. you were injured then and you had momentarily thought he was one of the slave traders that was trying to capture you. it took you a while to get used to him being like this when he appears out of the blue. well, for a random person, it would seem frightening to see a masked stranger dressed in black robes suddenly appear in mid-air. plus the saber tucked in his belt.

“master.” you greet him, anticipation lingering inside you.

“we shall continue your training today, my acolyte.” his modulated voice says. you feel your chest swell with excitement as you nodded. “be prepared.”

“of course, master.” you bowed slightly as he walks off to where the sparring lessons usually are. you smiled to yourself, maybe this time he’d finally put more effort in your training as you walk with a slight spring in your steps.

・゜゜・．

“focus.”

he says as your feet scraped against the rocks at his force push. you huff, your chest heaving, your leather tunic is starting to stick on your glistening sweaty skin, making you feel uncomfortable. you sigh, frustrated how you were not landing a single blow on him. your mind was elsewhere, seeming that you are still focused on wondering what he looks like underneath that mask.

“use that frustration. focus on your emotions.” he commands and you composed yourself, swatting the questions of his unknown face in your head. you ready yourself in a fighting stance, body facing to the side while you wave your arm in front of you. you clenched your fist for a moment as you heed into his words and attack. you use the force to heighten your leap towards him as you land a blow but he dodges again. an uppercut, he doges, a kick you do he dodges again. you feel yourself get even more irritated but in ease that he was finally not holding back when he blocks one of your blows with his arm.

but still, you were still not fighting the way he has to expect you to fight.

“you are too trustful in me, acolyte.” he scolds you, the modulated tone ringing. he backs away from you as you stopped, confused. yes, you indeed trust him, why was it a bad thing?

“i beg your pardon, master?” your breaths are labored and somehow from the close distance, you could hear him sigh underneath the mask.

“you are too trustful.” he says again. “do not trust me that i will not kill you even if i am training you. trust in yourself. we cannot continue this lesson if you do not learn to do that.” a chill runs through your spine at his words. there’s a slight pang of hurt in those words of his that were true. yes, he could kill you. why wouldn’t he if you failed him? you seem to stiffen at his words as he reminds you again, this time he will take the offensive attack.

“trust is a fragile thing. you cannot trust anyone but yourself, my acolyte. even if the person has sworn to trust you, they would eventually betray you. but yourself? you cannot betray yourself.” he explains as you nodded at his words. “when since you had put your whole trust in someone and they betrayed you in the end?”

you look at him, rage starting to boil in you when you remembered your own sister’s betrayal. your chest tightens and your mind is enraged with it. the pain she had put you in, the survival you had to do, the running you had to tire and the people you had to kill just to be free-

“there it is.” he says, proud. feeling your ever glowing rage.

“now, focus.” he suddenly attacks you as you dodged swiftly. both of you move in a tandem, as if it were a dance. the painful realization that even your master, the one who saved you and took you in, would eventually might betray you as well. the rage in you is at its boiling point as you let out a guttural scream when he almost aims for your neck. you push him back with your force then surging to him with heat in your steps as you attacked. he blocks your powerful blow with two of his arms forming an x. you kick him immediately on the stomach and he lurches, caught off guard.

you were too in to your emotions as you attacked and attacked. he tries to doge and block your every hit but he eventually succumbs to your rage when you finally kicked him to the ground. before he could stand, you immediately come on top of him, preventing that. you fist the collar of his robe, clenched hand in the air ready to land a final punch-

“excellent, my acolyte.” he cuts you off as you suddenly blink back into your rational self. you let go of his collar and you let yourself relax but ultimately surprised how close you are to him. you’re on top of him, your legs caging his waist and he seems not to dismiss you to get off. you can see clearly his helmet now, it was full of marks of previous battles. you take your time to admire him beneath you, how his adam’s apple bob and the sheen of sweat covering his bare muscular arms that were bulging with veins.

you blush, realizing you were staring at your master with ill thoughts.

but… the curiosity of what he looks like underneath it makes you wonder. your hand slowly comes up to his helmet and you feel him watch you with every move you make. he observes silently and you hovered your hand above his masked face. but you snap out of it again, realizing you could have offended him. and he could kill you for this. you know he takes great lengths to conceal his identity.

“a-apologies, master, i-“ before you could retract your hand and get off him. his hand suddenly grips your wrist. your eyes widened as he sits up and you adjust, hovering above his lap. he tilts his head to the side inquisitively, as if he was amused to see your curiosity be revealed. you stay quiet, staring at his masked face, waiting for his words. your cheeks are hot and you feel the anticipation grow in you. he places your hand on the side of his mask, the way he brushes your fingers softly makes you feel wobbly now.

“go on.” he merely says. you stutter, not knowing what to say. did he just agreed for you to remove his mask? your thoughts are jumbled but you succumb to your curiosity. you put both of your hands to both sides of his masked face. you slowly remove it inch by inch whilst you stared at the peaking facial features you have longed imagined what he looked like. you remove the helm completely and your heart skips a beat.

your eyes meet with a strangely beautiful dark ones.

his black hair is disheveled, his skin is smooth and his jawline is handsomely well chiseled. your eyes roam his face and it settles to his pink lips. you feel a hum of arousal between your legs when you look into his eyes again. his face is so close to yours that you can feel his hot breath tingle your lips. you put his helmet down to your side as the other brushes the black locks of his concealing his face. his pupils grow dark, your lips are inches to his and you somehow feel in-trance to lock it with yours.

this, this is the face of your master.

he’s beautiful. you think as you let out a noise when his other hand brush against your thigh. the other gently grips your hand that brushed his hair. you wondered why he had hidden his beautiful face from you and mae.

“master…” you plead as he smirks and it makes you blush.

“you did good today.” his low voice with a rasp of approval instead of the modulated one made your stomach churn and your thighs clench. the way his lips are still hovering above yours makes your head dizzy with the anticipation of what he’s doing. his top lip brushes against yours and he leans forward but before you could feel his soft lips lock with yours, you pull back. this is wrong.

“apologies, master.” you place your hands on his chest as you pulled yourself up to your feet. he seems taken aback for a moment with your rejection but composes himself as he eyes you up with a dark glint in his eyes.

“curiosity is normal. don’t be embarrassed.” he chuckles and that rings through your ears. the way he acts now is dissimilar to when he has his mask on and it baffles you how human he now is. you don’t know what to say, fearing that you have failed him in almost every way. you watch him stand up then grabbed his helmet and he looks at you. something in his gaze shines with hunger.

“we’ll continue our lesson another time.” he walks pass you and the brush of his arm against yours makes your heart jump.

“yes, master.” the initial shock of the situation still hasn’t faded when he’s out of your sight. you gulp, sweat dripping down your forehead. was he not upset that you know his face now? would he kill you for it later perhaps? those questions hang in the air. your heart still beats remembering his lips close to yours. you turn back, walking back to the shore, there’s a feeling you can’t seem to place as you let your thoughts linger on your master’s revealed face.

・゜゜・．

you dry your face with a rag then pulled a fresh tunic and bottoms from your pile of fresh clean robes. the dimness of the light inside your room in the cave made it comforting for your wild thoughts. you put on the brown tight bottoms then the grey tunic. but those thoughts soon come alive when you felt a presence near the entrance of your room.

you turn around swiftly, seeing your master standing right by the concave opening of your room. no mask on but just wearing… perfectly normal clothing. he dawned a white tunic and usual black bottoms, his hair is slicked back, damp from his bath you presumed. you stand awkwardly, not knowing what to say or do. you were used to his mysterious persona.

“you did exceptionally well today.” he begins with a praise. “but, i am surprised how focused you are on knowing what i look like.”

“thank you.” you merely say, eyes shying away when he points out your curiosity. “i apologize for that, master.”

“don’t be.” he steps forward and each step he takes has an anticipation behind them. you stay in your place, taking in how comforting he looks. “i’m glad for your curiosity.” he confesses.

“you are?” you are surprised with that.

qimir nods, adoring the way you seemed so surprised. he had his reasons for concealing his identity to you and mae. it was for to create a distance between the master and pupil. he feared attachment might overcome why he took you under his wing. he knows you already saw him as a person who finally cared for you and in truth, he does. you are a gifted woman with the force and over the years despite the distance he placed, you managed to crawl into his cold heart.

“but i fear your curiosity isn’t sated enough.” he points out and the atmosphere in the room changes. you know what he means. when you had almost kissed him but you hesitated, fearing that things might change drastically after that. he was your master after all. he steps closer to you, the distance is just like the one moments ago.

“am i right?” he asks when you stare at his lips. you wondered if mae would be enraged for what you are about to do as your body moved at its own accord.

you surge forward and lock your lips with his.

and that ends up with you sprawled underneath him. your curiosity is sated and he rewards you more with a thrust of his hips with his cock inside you. you clench around him, your hands caressing the width of his broad back. here you are, your naked body pressed against his as you moan in his ear. he groans, suckling the soft flesh of your neck.

“master…” you sigh, legs wrapped around tight on his waist. his hands are holding your thighs in place as he thrusts his cock into your warm heat. he locks eyes with your heavy one and it makes him soar at the feeling of you wrapped around him. he smirks as he kisses you hotly as he grinds his hips down.

your curiosity indeed was successfully sated by him.

[themattress]

A great, positive look at the Sequel Trilogy from the same guy who made this video. 

Don’t agree with him on everything he says, but his overall point is absolutely correct. 

[phoenixyfriend]

AU where Xanatos is "redeemed by the power of cute," but it's actually a psychological whammy caused by Obi-Wan being supernaturally adorable as a species-specific juvenile defense mechanism, and is functionally immediate brainwashing by the 13yo who doesn't know that's what he's doing.

Tbh this is mostly just Defense Mechanism that makes Xanatos harmless, but in a way everyone finds very concerning and uncomfortable because it's kind of mind control.

Someone (@dracothulhu) asked if it was related to Mimic Spider AU, and it is not! Mimic spider AU is just "ohhhh you wanna fuck me so b--PSYCH! EATING YOU."

This is more "I'm a little baby, I'm SUCH a little baby, you don't want to hurt me, you could never hurt me, I'm so adorable I'm so cute doesn't it just kill you to think about hurting me?"

Mimic spider AU is just Hot and Confident. This is straight up Mind Whammie.

@threebea also thought brood parasitism, and offered:

I'm trying to figure out a reason for the Stewjoni to have like brood parasitism where they will stick their young with other families for awhile before picking them up Used to do it to Mandoalorians all the time, and it's part of the reason the Mandalorian adopt anything stereotype got so strong. Stewjoni looking at Jedi: those seem parent shaped here you go

Which is great, except I actually started with the idea of it being kind of the inverse!

(That said, I won't actually say no to the brood parasitism option.)

Xanatos: had been about to kidnap and put him on a deep sea mine now is feeding him pudding Is it he's acting normal but doing weird things or is he suddenly talking to Obi-Wan like he's an adorable puppy

He's kind of zoned out.

Xanatos: look at him so cute Omg Obi-Wan: standing there Xanatos: kriff I don't have a camera - also from threebea

Also cuddles! Which Obi-Wan actually Does Not Want. But if he's Very Very Still then maybe Qui-Gon will find him and fix this.

Like if a tiger held and groomed you and you just were waiting Very Still for the zookeeper to distract it and/or load up the tranq.

After the days he's had he'd perhaps like a cuddle but not from this guy Lol Xanatos: so soft The effect only works on humans and near humans so it didn't work on the hutt and (can't remember the other species) on the ship

We can say it works through the Force and that's why the Hutt is immune.

"Stewjoni are targets of slavers" but specifically for illegal adoptions. It's lucrative, because most bounty hunters last about twenty seconds before they give the crying baby back where it wants to go.

And most of the immune ones get caught by planetary defense forces.

So if you CAN steal a baby, the profit margin is insane, since it's so damn hard to do, but the baby up for illegal adoption is sooooo cute.

(…this concept would be hilarious with one of those "Tor adopts baby Ben Kenobi to turn into a weapon" AUs. Still a shitty childhood bc Death Watch can justify a lot under the umbrella of Teaching Self-Defense. But interesting.)

IF YOU HAVE READ TWILIGHT: do you remember the bit about vampire babies being so cute that people would let them slaughter entire villages without a qualm?

It's like that, except Obi-Wan doesn't have dreams of mass slaughter and it only really activates as a Threat Response.

I guess the evolutionary trigger is it's kind of a paralytic You can't move far from where you stole the kid

Which is exactly right!

[artist-issues]

This is an admirable point to try to make about the Sequel Trilogy, but it doesn't hold up in-context, at all. But Star Wars fans don't tend to look at the context of the story. They don’t tend to look at the new story like it's a story, with character set-up and follow-through. They tend to look at it like it's a Star Wars Movie.

Rey caring about whether or not her parents were someone significant happened as a natural progression of her obsession with them after The Forxe Awakens. Literally, after the force awakens in her, she transfers that new facet of her life onto the one all-consuming character motivation she has: to be somebody to someone. It just took new shape because The Force was suddenly in her life in a major way. But it was very in-character, and consistent.

She always wanted to be someone--to her parents--which you can see at the beginning of The Force Awakens when she looks very uncomfortable at the idea of turning into a solitary old woman, alone and nobody on Jakkuu. So yeah, she wants to "be somebody--" but just "somebody who is loved." And the idea of her parents is her comfort-fantasy, so when she's jettisoned into this galaxy-arena of legendary dynastic force-weilders, of course she hopes her parents will become the new frame for all of that. She’s just shifting her motivation to match her new environment. You know. Like a character.

Finn and Rose don't think del Toro's character is a "rogue with a heart of gold." They find him in a cell, after already associating the Casino Proprietors to be shorthand for the First Order--so they naturally assume he got there by leaning away from the First Order. Plus, he (with BB-8) saved them from being recaptured. And despite his speech, they did pay him. They thought no more than "here's a guy who's certainly crossed the First Order before, and he knows how to get us in, and we literally have no other plan or time to make a new one, and we paid him, so this is our only option."

Are they upset when he betrayed them? Yeah. But if you've been allies in a life-or-death situation for any length of time, and they've not only helped you out before but also gave you back your special necklace apparently out of kindness, then they get you killed at the last second? And you have a chance to express your anger about that? You're gonna do it. It would be unnatural for you, as a character, not to express that anger. Doesn't mean you've been 100% CONVINCED the whole time that he "had a heart of a gold all along" and this was such a shock to you.

Rose is Pre-established in the movie to tend toward idealism, and hero-worship. Finn has only been a part of the Resistance for a tiny bit of time, and used to be a Stormtrooper--she has every reason to distrust him OR trust him--and we're shown that she chooses trust. She's all starry-eyed and hero-worshipping--until he insinuates that he's jumping ship. (Because she's not stupid, even if her default setting is initially "trust, have faith in the good.") And then even after she tazes him, and he admits to wanting to run away, even though that's a direct insult to her sister's fresh sacrifice, she still chooses to work with him. Knowing that he's kind of untrustworthy, she chooses to give him a chance anyway. And she's the one that shows the little kid the Resistance Ring, in the slave stalls, with no reason to believe that it will mean anything to him. Just like she's the kind of character to believe DJ will be true to his word.

That's the kind of character she is, right from the get-go. Its you who expected DJ to be a "rogue with a heart of gold" trope, because you've seen Star Wars movies. Rose just happens to be written to also lean toward trust (within reason) rather than mistrust, even if a rogue. What's your excuse? You're a "Star Wars fan."

Same thing with Rey's "training." At no point does Rey describe what she wants as specific "training--" she describes what she wants in a very in-character way. Firstly, she wants Luke to come back (oh, just like her obsession with her ideal parental figures "coming back") and save the day. When he won't, and asks why they sent her to find him, she reluctantly explains that she needs someone to "show [her] her place in all of this." Vague. Reluctant. Far from asking for a training montage. She doesn't want to save the day, she wants to be important (read: "loved") by someone, and she wants LUKE to save the day. That's always her character. She doesn't want to be the hero, she just wants to be loved and belong somewhere, to someone. It's you that heard her say "show me my place in all this" and translated it to "give me a training montage," devoid of build-up and context. Because you're a watcher of Star Wars movies.

Same thing with Poe. The filmmaker very clearly sets up why he shouldn't get to know the plan: he has a disregard for human life, and a bit of a hero complex, and he doesn't look at the "big picture." Leia might have given him grace and told him of the plan because she knows he has potential--but Leia got knocked unconscious, and her second-in-command did the best she could with what she knew: a hothead who disobeys direct orders and gets people killed and is punished for it by her wise friend comes around demanding to know the plan, right after being demoted, in a life-or-death situation? She's not going to tell him the plan. It would not make sense for her to tell him the plan, in the movie you're watching. Not if she's going to behave in-character. In fact, the only way Holdo could've known enough to make the decision to give Poe sensitive information in good faith would be if...she somehow knew that he was the rough-around-the-edges but ultimately-trustworthy protagonist of a Star Wars movie.

See, it sounds good to say that "they knew they were in a Star Wars movie, that's why they act 'inconsistently!'" Sounds good. Until you look to see if they're actually inconsistent--and they're not. (Not in TFA or TLJ, I disregard ROS but that's another post.)

When you watch the story like it's a story, you see that the filmmakers set it all up beautifully. It's a natural follow-through of each character you mentioned to do what they did in TLJ. Especially in those scenarios, which were cleverly written by moviemakers who knew what you, the audience (not the characters) would expect to see. You're just proving that you're the one making much out of the fact that they're "a protagonist in a Star Wars movie."

Star Wars fans expected TLJ and TFA to follow some specific patterns, or fulfill specific wishes commonly associated with Star Wars. When the ends of the story didn't follow/fulfill those, they totally missed the means used to get there.

In any other story, you couldn't just say "Rey defeated Kylo Ren with no problem and no training." You'd notice that the fight is set up with specific context like:

Rey has fought off competitors for scraps and for survival every day of her life on a desert planet; she might not have formal training in a specific art, but she knows plenty about using a stick to fight for her life.

Kylo Ren is not trying to kill her. He is actively trying to convince her to join him; he's not even interested in maiming her, just overpowering and intimidating her.

Even if he was trying to kill her, he'd have a hard time of it: he is injured from a blaster bolt shot, which we saw blast away Stormtroopers in full gear earlier in the same story; so if we were watching this in good faith like any other story, we’d remember how much damage it can do and deduce how much weaker it’s making Kylo Ren.

He is trying to use the Dark Side of the Force--which is literally only powerful when you're enraged and convinced of your actions--but he is at his least convinced of his own actions. He already knows Rey is strong in the Force, so he’s seeing her as an unpredictable threat instead of the opponents hes used to dominating. Why do you think he knocked her out first?

He also just killed his father, which is supposed to make him feel stronger and freer, but CLEARLY IT IS NOT, so his emotions aren't working for him in the Force: they're working against him because they're unsteady. He’s confused; the rite he was told would make him stronger is emotionally crippling him. Not a great time to need steady emotions for a battle.

In the meantime, Rey has just recently opened herself up to the Force despite all her reluctance and holding it back, and it turned out really well. And she's defending the one person who ever came back for her, showed her that she was important, and acted like she was special to him--Finn. So in contrast to Kylo Ren, she gets to use her survivalist stick-wielding experience and her emotions are channeled and her faith is finally experiencing its first and best burst in emotional confidence. While he's having trouble getting his emotions to channel the Force because of the in-character reaction to the established situation, she is having the least trouble getting her emotions to channel the Force, for the first time in the whole movie!

Anyone who watches this story never having seen a Star Wars movie before will see that everything is set up carefully, then followed-through carefully (until ROS, which we don't talk about.) But if you watch it as a Star Wars Fan? You're not taking in the details and the context and the foreshadowing. You're looking for fulfilled tropes. You're not listening to what the characters are saying and watching their facial expressions. You're listening to hear the keywords and phrases you've learned from other movies.

You're not watching a movie. You're watching a Test of Star Wars Formula Adherence...and then giving the filmmakers a bad grade, according to your own standard. And it’s a rigged standard. It’s not the same standard used for all stories.

(P.S. @frasier-crane-style and anyone who bothered reading all this: if it feels tedious and aggravating to read through a list of all the things that the characters did in the Sequel movies and have them explained to you, this is why; they’re obvious. You already knew them. They were clear in the movie. They were good explanations for what was going on; they just weren’t the explanations you were looking for, so you rejected them.)

Why The Last Jedi doesn't work as subversion is that it continuously requires the characters to act like they KNOW they're characters in Star Wars and not LIVING the Star Wars.

I'll give you an example. Rey. In TFA, her parents are simply missing and she's waiting for them to come back. In TLJ, she suddenly thinks they're an important secret for Kylo to reveal to her because she's pathologically suppressed the truth that they're drunks who sold her for alcohol money (or, you know, blue milk money, whatever).

But why would she ever think that she had an important family or heritage unless she knew she was the protagonist of a space epic and having an important family or heritage is something that happens to those?

Or DJ. The Benecio del Toro character is supposed to be a subversion of the rogue with a heart of gold trope. But why would Finn and Bangs ever think he's a rogue with a heart of gold that's implicitly trustworthy? They find him in a prison cell and have no reason to think he has any loyalty to the Resistance--he even gives a speech about how he considers the First Order and the Resistance to be equally bad!

In ANH, both Luke and Obi-Wan treated Han like exactly what he was, a mercenary, who had to be cajoled into helping out until finally he showed his true colors by attacking the Death Star. They didn't know they were characters going through a story arc. The Sequel Trilogy characters act like they do, until Rian Johnson pranks them by twisting the story arc they had no reason to think they were participating in.

And the entire Luke storyline is a subversion of the entire idea of mentorship. Luke doesn't teach Rey anything. She doesn't need to be taught anything. It's unclear why she even thinks she does, given that she already beat down Kylo Ren with ease, but, again, character in a story. She thinks she needs a training montage, Rian says "she doesn't get a training montage!", and scene.

It's all very meta and post-modern and taken at face value, it doesn't make any sense once you ask obvious questions like "Why shouldn't Poe know that there is a plan to save the fleet?" Defenders of TLJ dismiss those obvious questions because they see them as unimportant next to the post-modern gamesmanship the movie is really concerned with, but Star Wars doesn't work like a Scream movie, where the characters are largely obsessed with horror movies and then, ironically, placed inside a horror movie.

That's a kind of cynicism that doesn't really work for Star Wars; you can't do a sincere narrative about the triumph of good over evil when the characters are mostly convinced there's no big difference between Good or Evil winning.

To go back to ANH, Obi-Wan is emphatic about how wonderful the Jedi were, how tragic it was that they were wiped out, how awful it is to live under the Empire, and how important it is to fight to restore the Republic. That's the baseline of sincerity that this kind of primordial mythmaking needs to work.

With TLJ, most every character on both sides are cynical, foolish, corrupt, power-tripping, shrill, pompous... most of all, incompetent. It seems less like an epic battle between the noble and the venal--more like two competing cliques of sitcom characters, only one of them is inexplicably Nazi-themed. You're left pretty much adrift, with no characters to sympathize with and no conflicts to become invested in, just visuals and 'themes'.

But children can't get invested in themes or subversion. Neither can most people. It's the province of the elitist to care about subtext over story--the sick doldrums of modern art--and Star Wars isn't for them. It's for the people.

[charmwasjess]

Strap in for the Soresu form III Obi-Wan lightsaber post. This is gonna be a sad one, girlies. We’re getting into Obi-Wan’s Fucking Trauma. 

Qui-Gon’s death changed literally everything about Obi-Wan’s life, right down to the lightsaber form. Still a Padawan himself, he had to watch as an extinct monster from his nightmares* utterly took apart the form he’d learned since he was a child, and then, to complete the destruction, slaughtered the teacher who’d taught him the form and raised him. The devastation of Qui-Gon’s actual death had to be the last in a cascading series of horrors that started with the gut-sinking realization that Qui-Gon was losing. And if all of that weren’t enough, Obi-Wan also loses his own lightsaber in the same duel, a psychological blow to his personhood which we don’t have to guess at the significance of. Obi-Wan tells us the cost of it himself in AotC: this weapon is your life. 

The Duel of the Fates on a sheer physical level is a devastating thing to consider. It’s a grueling, full out running battle, the likes of which we don’t see elsewhere in the saga. The beauty (and pounding musical score) of the fight distracts from the sheer brutality of it. Maul is physically attacking them at every turn; he manages to kick Qui-Gon hard enough to knock all 6’3 of him off his feet; he dumps Obi-Wan into a fall that seems to be several stories high. We don’t see Obi-Wan get back up off the floor with Qui-Gon’s body at the end of the duel, and I’d be surprised if he was physically able to even stand again so after the adrenaline faded and the soreness and exhaustion took over. He just been whirled in a lightsaber blender. 

I can’t imagine how hard it was for him to pick up a lightsaber again after the trauma of that battle - much less, a new, unfamiliar one, not the kyber crystal that had been his since he was a child. The new canon’s emphasis on the spiritual relationship between a Jedi and their crystal makes this detail even more excruciating. The Ataru form itself must have felt broken and unusable. How can you put your trust in a form once you watched it be broken so ruthlessly?

And this is where Obi-Wan is so endlessly beautiful as a character. He goes through this horrifying experience of violent unmaking, and instead of avoiding lightsabers as an understandable trauma response, or picking up an overwhelming power and dominance form like V, he remakes himself into a master of Soresu: a form of simple, complete defense. He doesn’t attempt to become a weapon of attack like Maul did to disintegrate Ataru; he makes himself invincible, untouchable, with a perfect defense. Soresu works the pieces that fell apart for the Jedi in the Duel of the Fates to an advantage. It is a form of ultimate endurance, of playing out your opponent and staying up in a fight until the attacker is exhausted or angry. It preserves and it lasts. It is philosophical. It is considered. It lacks the showy flash of Makashi or Ataru and returns to the basics, even working in some of that battlefield meditation that Qui-Gon so believed in. And in that simple economy, it’s gorgeous and effective. 

I have to wonder: is Soresu, on some level, a form of kinetic self-soothing for a person who faced an incredibly traumatic battle at a young age? Does Obi-Wan use it that way?

All of this is perfectly in keeping with the themes of the character. Obi-Wan’s story remains about life, about hope, about survival. The word he uses to describe the Jedi to Luke in the OT is important to me. “Jedi knights were the guardians of peace and justice.” Guardians. And what better lightsaber approach for a person who sees his role as one of protection than a form whose signature move is called “The Circle of Shelter?”

*Maul, of course, is a tragedy in his own right, but that’s a different post.