#sw tfa cast

[spectordameron]

I also really love this bit because not only is it a great bit of foreshadowing for Tomasso's eventual death, it's also a great bit of foreshadowing to Zeva's — she never once questions that Zorii will follow in her footsteps, that she'll remain fully obedient to her mother's wishes, loyal to Zeva's cause, so she's ignorant to the conflict inside Zorii right up until the moment Zorii stands between Zeva and the boy who helped her realize she could be so much more than her mother made her.

[reachexceedinggrasp]

Have you seen the recent Adam driver interview re: redeemed Ben solo never being part of the original plans? Apparently JJs idea as pitched to Adam was 'reverse Vader' who begins the trilogy all uncertain and vulnerable and becomes super evil by the third film 😂 considering the mess that was duel of the fates, I'm not surprised. Adam said he was still 'focused' on JJs original arc even though it changed over shooting. Which is baffling to me, because even in TFA you can't seriously believe this character could go stone cold uber sinister. It's terrible how so many good things in the sequel trilogy are there in spite of tptb, not because of them!

I haven't and honestly at this point I don't even want to hear anything else about what a complete fucking shitshow of stupidity and sociopathy this whole production was.

The idea that TFA isn't setting up a redemption is so absurd to me that I'm not even going to entertain it. I don't believe that even JJ is that incompetent, and his commentary plus TROS indicates that he did absolutely understand that Ben must be reclaimed despite his total disregard for the themes and message of SW. So whatever Adam was talking about, I don't know, and I'm not going to listen to this interview to try to figure it out because I'm tired. Maybe he's referring to the earliest ideas where Kylo Ren wasn't the same person as Han and Leia's child?

But in that case I just cannot imagine why they wanted to cast him in that role.

Leaving aside that the entire concept of a 'reverse Vader' is the stupidest shit I've ever heard, because that was a) literally the prequel trilogy, b) antithetical to SW as anything other than a prelude to a subsequent redemption, and c) SO FUCKING BORING. I know this isn't the first time Adam has mentioned this, but it only sounds more stupid the more clear he makes it that they mean 'the opposite of the ending of RotJ'. Which is just 'the ending of every fucking American action movie fucking ever'. Like putting a 'spin' on Vader by having him NOT REDEEM HIMSELF is just called 'being like everyone else' and 'taking away literally the most compelling thing about Vader'.

I need these boring, unimaginative HACKS to fuck off. Like, the idea that JJ's pitch for TFA was 'worse, more boring, less visually creative, less meaingful, more shallow remake of ANH but also we will ruin the heart and soul of the story and make it like all the libertarian slop it literally existed in order to stand against'.

LIKE JAIL FOR THIS MAN. JAIL!

I saw someone say that it's also come out that the reylo connection was Kasdan's idea, which I feel vindicated by bc I've been saying I bet it was forever. But again, JJ was on board for it and knew what he was doing with the imagery in TFA. He is not so incompetent that he didn't understand he was creating romantic subtext. And text.

But like, I'm just so done with these fucking people. That ANYONE at that company much less apparently EVERYONE?? thought it was remotely acceptable to use SW to tell the story of any character whatsoever who was humanised and sympathetic and relatable to children falling into darkness and becoming ''''''irredeemable'''''' MUCH LESS the LAST SKYWALKER, the HOPE AND HAPPY ENDING OF ROTJ, HAN AND LEIA'S LOVE, PADMÉ'S LOVE, the atonement and reconciliation of Darth Vader is just FUCKING BANANAPANTS to me.

George Lucas should fight these people in an alley.

[risingshards]

I finished Jedi Survivor and have to talk about it and nobody I know has it WAHHH

MAJOR SPOILERS FOLLOW

My thought as the catharsis of finishing settles is that I think it's one of my favorite Star Wars things like ever.

For reference, my tippy top tier of Star Wars is the OT (duh), KOTOR series, OG Battlefronts, Mandalorian (particularly S2), Visions (especially The Twins which is maybe my favorite #1 SW thing because I'm so obsessed with Am and it's like Star Wars I love distilled into half an hour), TFA, and some particular TCW and Rebels arcs. There's probably more that I'm forgetting I tend to do that. And of course the Jedi series.

My Jedi series history: I remember at Celebration 2019, one of the best experiences of my life, I left one of the meet and greets (I met Ian McDiarmid and Billy Dee Williams!!!) and my partner at the time and I looked at the main stage and were like "wait what the fuck is Ian from Shameless doing here?!?!" Because we were in lines all day, we didn't see the announcement that Fallen Order was a thing.

And then the first one was a great time. Maybe a bit too hard for my game ability, but with difficulty turned down I was able to handle it. I loved how they just let Cal be kind, just a sweet good dude, like the true spirit of what a Jedi can be is in him, BD-1 is one of the best game companions ever, the supporting cast of Merrin/Cere/Greez was REAL good, loved the main villain and made sure to get her figure and Cal's, and the failure is not the end scene made me ugly ugly cry and is one of my favorite (I'm talking favorite a lot which I think is a persistent theme for me playing this series). So I was excited for Survivor obviously.

And it was very very good. There are a lot of things I can't stop thinking about in game, I had trouble sleeping one night (not cuz of the game it was just one of my "well we aren't sleeping tonight" nights and spent most of it just like "wow what about this thing in jedi survivor" which is the sign of a game I either supremely cared about or was supremely troubled about (for example of the latter, I legit lost sleep after finishing Mass Effect 3 LOL).

I loved how big the opening was and how well it told the themes of the story and Cal's journey, weary from fighting the Empire and weary from losing friend after friend.

The inciting incident of Cal finding the frozen in bacta Jedi from the High Republic era Dagan Gera was my like "YES. OH MY GOD YES. RESPAWN YOUR VISION FOR STAR WARS IS JUST LIKE THIS IS WHAT I WANT!!!" Something about this angsty anime boy villain had me like "RELEASE THE ACTION FIGURE FOR HIM ASAP PLEASE HE'S COOOOOOOL." And the High Republic thing had me excited for Cal to get a new story that was his own deal that wasn't just Cal vs. Empire (well. didn't get that entirely but the main thrust of the story was the High Republic adventure which was fun.)

The family aspect was handled really well here too, with Cal's family being separated and you gradually reunite with them. Greez is like the lovable grandpa uncle, Cere the new parent/guardian figure to Cal after losing his previous one, and Merrin as the scary gf. BD-1 of course the loyal best friend pet, I have a small dog so like BD 1 and Cal's friendship hits so hard for me.

I thought the moral of the game would be like "you don't need to have this big mythical home in Tanalorr to go for, you have one to establish in Koboh" but they twisted me similarly to Cal breaking the holocron in Fallen Order. The Jedha battle with the crazy walker thing was amazing, and Cal and Merrin are so sweet together that I dug the kiss a lot.

The story felt like it halted for a bit after that and before getting to Dagan at the observatory, with the beautiful force vision duel with Dagan feeling like a "well the game COULD end here and I'd be pretty satisfied" moment. Then things went into high gear with Bode's betrayal leading to everything falling apart. Playing as Cere was amazing, and I did lose my mind for Vader showing up (love the parallel to him being in water for the first game and fire here, third game he'll be in the air or the dirt for the elemental trifecta). I definitely got emotional losing Cere, and thought that was really well handled, dealing with the tragic sense of "this couldn't end up any other way with Vader wanting revenge on her" well. As they said later, she got to go out winning her battle against the dark side and that's beautiful.

The last act of the game is mostly focused on dealing with Bode's betrayal. Cal's dalliances with the dark side are super interesting, because nothing is the same once he gets that first taste. Even the pause menu is tainted afterwards, as if a part of his soul is corrupted by just tapping into that incredible energy once. Mechanically it was a bit clunky to make tapping into the dark side a forced thing like in the last boss fight, and a bit of a clone of Ghost of Tsushima's ghost stance but Sucker Punch ya won't make Sly 5 so I'm not gonna judge if people take stuff from ya. Bode was gone by the end and willing to physically hurt his own daughter so like I didn't feel bad about Cal tapping into the dark side to defeat him (when Bode hit BD-1, that was his "oh there's no coming back for this guy is there" moment). I really loved the ending with the pyre funeral for Cere, Cordova, and Bode. It felt like a movie ending, and Cal talking to Cere about being so afraid of failing, of losing himself to the darkness was beautiful and probably the closest the game got to the failure speech in terms of making me bawl from the first game. After finishing, I felt like I had just finished watching a movie, like the same cathartic feeling of finishing a big Star Wars movie.

My bigger downsides: 155GB for a console game is fucking absurd. That stretch of time where it was just gameplay with the story being light was a bit of a drag (those sequences of just wave after wave of enemy were BS), and it felt like there weren't a lot of planets total (unless the side missions add planets because I just played the main story, that'd be cool if the bounties sent you back to old planets from the first game). I REALLY wish Dagan Gera had more to do and wasn't in the same role as Taron Malicos where he's the like sub-antagonist that gets offed relatively easily because I feel like there was so much more potential with a reawakened High Republic Era Jedi who immediately falls to the dark side. Like Second Sister, I do wish there was more with these super interesting villain characters before they get somewhat anticlimactically killed off, but cool as fuck villains getting somewhat anticlimactically killed off is basically Star Wars tradition.

I think it's a downside of the time period that at the end of the day the Empire has to be the big bad looming over everything. I'd love to see Respawn get a blank slate (there are a couple teams I'd love to see get a blank slate doing their own Star Wars from scratch, like Respawn, the Clone Wars team...) where they aren't beholden to have things fit into a timeline. But the Jedi series has been fine about that so far and nothing's felt like too hopeless or too crunching into a timeline. It was kind of cool in a video game-y way that you can be like "Oh it's the sequel so the formula is setting in, oh here's the sub villain, now we beat them, oh here's a surprise Vader appearance, etc. etc." I was excited for the Raiders led by Dagan to be a new threat for Cal and co., but because it's the Emprie reign era the Imps end up taking the main villain focus, which makes sense ofc, but I'm a slut for new factions.

Another downside that's not the game's fault: I'm streaming the game for a friend, and they guessed the entire plot immediately and I'm so mad at them about it because I hadn't pieced anything together when they did LOL. 30 seconds into Bode's appearance they were like "he did it. traitor. he's a spy for the empire and killed everyone there. i bet vader shows up too" and now I'm like I HOPE YOU DIDNT READ SPOILERS AND ARE JUST ACTING LIKE YOU PREDICTED THIS CUZ THAT'S A LITTLE TOO SPOT ON but I know they're just a genre savvy type. usually I can guess the immediate traitor which is a trope of games but I was just like "bode's voice actor voiced kotallo and charles :) " Part of me is thinking of ways to convince them they're wrong to mislead them as revenge but I'd have to act really well to pull that off and that'd be mean lmao.

What I'm hoping for to close out the trilogy assuming it gets a third game: I don't want Cal to turn to the dark side, but I do trust this team to handle his battle with it well. In a galaxy of tragic endings, there aren't many I want to have a happy ending more than Cal so that's my main hope for the third game. I hope Cal and his family establishing the hidden path is their way out of avoiding a fate of just "vader and the empire wipe them out because canon dictates it so." They've done so well so far that I trust this team to handle wrapping up Cal's story well, so I'm mainly just excited for what's next.

[redrascal1]

In a few weeks time, it will be three years since the release of TROS and ultimately what I didn't realise at the time, was going to be the end of my love for SW, a love I'd had for over forty years.

I still find it hard to accept that they erased every single one of Lucas's heroes (except Lando) as well as killing off arguably the most fascinating and complex characters ever created in the saga. Worse, is why they did it.

They did it because Kylo Ren was stealing the show.

Tom Hiddleston stole the show in the Avengers/Thor films. The movies all had great actors, but Tom's sardonic, ruthless yet vulenrable Trickster god was the one who got the most fans. And therefore...he had to go. But Loki has returned on tv. Disney/Marvel realised they had killed off a potential cash cow, so they resurrected Loki.

DLF, however, seem to be stubbornly refusing to accept what a colossal mistake they have made. Instead of finding a way of bringing back Ben Solo, they are placating fans with tv series set in the past, and at the moment appear to have made a success of it. But ...how long can they live in the past?

Sooner or later they are going have to go beyond the good old days, and look to the future. And they have frankly, seriously damaged their future by killing of the most popular of the new characters created for the ST.

DLF decided that the ST must have a female protagonist, so Rey was created. Which is fine. But the problem was, her character was nowhere near as interesting as that of the 'antagonist'. It isn't Daisy Ridley's fault, as she had to play Rey as written, but it took TROS to prove just how uninteresting the characters of Rey, Finn and Poe are compared to Kylo.

The Trio do have their fans, I've seen a lot of them on SW forums, but outside us 'geeks'. Kylo is by far an away the most popular of the ST cast. It was proved by the official poll on DLF's own SW site, which he won by 81% of the votes....Rey got just 5%.

Finn, whose fans insist was meant to be leading man, got 1%.

The public took Adam Driver's unhappy anti villain to their hearts, and wanted more of him. Not the supposedly main protagonist.

And DLF chose to give them more of...Rey.

Because, as I've said before Abrams wanted Rey as a replacement for Kylo. She was supposed to be the 'more deserving' child of the Skywalkers, replacing their tainted flesh and blood. Take the excellent TLJ out of the saga and you have 'How Rey Stole the Skywalker Legacy - with their blessings'.

Rey won Han's admiration in five minutes in TFA. At the end of the film, it was Rey Leia hugged, not Chewie - she hugged a young woman she had never met, who would have perished at her orders if not for Finn, instead of the Wookie who had been another brother for thirty years.

And TROS hammered that home. Rey got the Skywalker sabres, the Falcon, the 'family name'. Supplementary material declared her as 'Han's true heir'. She had the same desert background as Luke, the same type of clothing. This is excruciating enough, but the fact that their real child was neglected, ignored, and targeted all his life by a predator makes it a truly unpleasant message - essentially Han and Leia screwed up, so they picked an upgrade. No wonder many real life abuse victims who identified with Kylo are unhappy about this.

It's not just unfair, it's disturbing.

At the end of the day, if DLF want to continue the story past the ST - and they are apparently now discussing this - they will have to hope that the future projects which will have to feature The Trio will be lucrative.

And will they? Because the poor reception TROS, the film meant to make everyone love Rey, recieved from the general public has proved unequivocally that people wanted more Kylo.Not more Rey, Rey, Rey. As well as proving that her character was at it's most interesting when interacting with him. Rey Palpatine can't carry her own film(s).

And outside fans on the JCF ...does anyone really want Finn/Rey? The sexual chemistry just isn't there, no matter what John and Daisy want. A 'reylo inspired' book has become a best seller. The Rise of Kylo Ren comic was a huge success.DLF threw away what could have been SW's most stirring and unforgettable romance, and their best character, in order to pander to a minority. No one's fault but theirs.

[chronicowboy]

idc how many times it's been said or will be said the fact that oscar isaac read a script and saw poe dameron, the lovable rebel with reckless tendencies, a little cocky, but he's got a big heart, the classic "playboy" protagonist and then immediately read about finn and went "oh poe's gay. yup. 100%", spent all the press tours reiterating this decision and taking his chance to be all love dovey with john is and always will be very sexy of him

[solocommaben]

I may get so much hate for this. Please don't hurt me.

A while back, someone decide to do a reboot of The Crow. I wasn't happy about it. A LOT of people weren't happy about it. The Crow is sacred in a way, so no director should TOUCH that.

I was even MORE unhappy when I found out that Jason Momoa was cast as Eric Draven. I mean, I like the guy, but to me, he was wrong for the role. Physically, he's too bulky. Also, I've never seen Jason in anything where he he wasn't angry, grunting, or being funny. If there is, please show me, but that's not enough range for Eric Draven. Eric's all over the map with that.

So, I was happy when it got shut down.

But, I was thinking, it's probably going to be attempted again as much as I don't want it to be. If they're going to reboot it, you know who should be cast as Eric Draven?:

HEAR ME OUT BEFORE JUMPING TO "EMO KYLO REN" OR "THAT GUY FROM GIRLS!

If you've seen him in anything other than those two, you'd know the guy can act. Don't believe me? Go watch Marriage Story or Blakkklansmen (however you're supposed to spell it). Also (and yes I do have to jump back to Kylo Ren):

Also, I just want to hear him scream this:

If you disagree, that's fine. It's only an idea about something that will (hopefully) never happen. Because, again, the original is already perfect. But, if a reboot is attempted again, cast Driver, not Momoa.

[harmonizingsunsets]

Butterflies Rising | Rey

“Don’t be afraid to leave it all behind...there is new light, and new life, there are new worlds waiting.”

[benperorsolo]

As much as it’s possible to feel sorry for rich famous people I feel kinda sorry for Daisy sometimes. I feel like JJ being the first director she worked with in a major film was a disadvantage for her growth as an actor. JJ doesn’t seem to have an organized production and takes so much input from actors (to the detriment of the film sometimes) and Imho that became her comfort zone. “Kids going on an adventure” isn’t the norm for most film sets and she obvi had trouble adjusting to that with TLJ

Daisy is a human being. I'm not saying don’t have empathy for her. I agree JJ being her first director was unfortunate. JJ listening to his actors and to random creeps on reddit is how TROS happened. I have no idea how much input Daisy had on the script, but her emotional attachment to the project suggests there might have been a bit there and it’s an additional reason why she feels upset people don’t like TROS-- it feels personal.

Also, so...interesting, how after TLJ Daisy seemed to respond to the detractors with poise (and zero comments on their treatment of KMT) but now suddenly after TROS there’s no “love.” So...interesting.

[mulhollandoates]

Post-TROS blues meets retail therapy. Spending more quality time with my space soulmates.

[doyouknowthemuffinmaam]

SW:TROS Pros and Cons #2

Cons: General Hux: In TFA General Hux was actually frightening in his nazi-esque fanaticism and intensity. He came across as an actual threat, and as decent competition for Kylo Ren. He was smart, capable, and had a menace to him that was superbly acted by Domnhall Gleeson. In TLJ he was still menacing to a degree but it was lessened by a few comedic foil moments that while entertaining, definitely took away from his impact. In TROS they destroyed him. He was made purely into the fool. He was whimpering and ineffective, and while his pettiness was again entertaining, his role here is so almost slapstick that it completely undermines his place and lessens his impact in the other films as well.

Pros: Richard E. Grant as General Pryde: Yaaaas! General Pryde was the best addition to this whole thing. Richard E. Grant played him with a cold efficiency that reminds you why the empire was so dominant and impossible to overthrow. General Pryde compared to General Hux reminds the audience of old Nazi vs Neo-Nazi. Both dangerous and frightening in very different ways. The sheer fanaticism of the new Hux while shocking and initially jarring ultimately pales in comparision to the absolute ruthless competence and intelligence that General Pryde brings as a servant to the Emperor. Richard E. Grant was great and you had the impression that General Pryde was much more in control of the First Order than Kylo Ren was even as ‘Supreme Leader’.

[cosmicrhetoric]

ive been trying to put this into words for like a week (literally since i left the theater) but i feel like the reason rey's character failed for me post TROS is the same reason the whole trilogy as a whole fell flat!!! wasted potential!!! you see this girl with a lot of kindness but an incredible amount of anger that threatens to consume her and it's so reminiscent of anakin's story (even without the parentage thing!!) in every way except that there's no guarantee of tragedy this time! there's every possibility that this girl can master herself and find a family and be happy. SO sticking her issues with self and anger as a result of/in conjunction with/in partnership with a man who not only rejected everything she wanted her whole life but chose fascism, strove for an ideal we know even anakin AND rey AND luke rejected in the end....it makes her story of self INSEPERABLE with ren!!! which is wrong on so many levels at least the previous main characters were given the right to their own stories...no i dont like r/eylo on account of having a brain but even if i tolerated it WHY was his "redemption" given the same if not more importance that the main character's?!?!?! the FIRST question rey makes us ask is who is she??? who is this girl??? not her lineage, but who is SHE? what will she become? and guess what y'all im STILL asking

[reachexceedinggrasp]

At least the failure of Solo proved that re-casting iconic SW characters is a gambit that doesn't pay off, in case Disney was getting any ideas before Solo's box office about doing a younger Kylo Ren spin-off with a different actor or straight-up rebooting the OT premise with a new cast the way JJ did Trek

When they were first announcing this flood of spin offs and shit (before I became convinced to give the ST a chance ahahaha), I kept saying it wasn’t going to work. Star Wars is a small world. It doesn’t seem like one but it really is, and it can’t sustain this kind of flogging at all. No one wants recasts of the iconic characters, no one wants a fucking ‘origin story’ for every supporting player. At least, no one in the general public wants that from a feature film- of course there are those who always enjoyed dumb trivia and they had the old EU for that.

But it’s so intensely focussed on the journey of one character at a time, it’s so character driven. It falls apart very quickly if you try to slide into the sides or to flesh it out too much. It’s a super specific thing and it only works in its own context. The rich, rounded characters of the OT who feel so vibrant and alive actually suffer from being looked at too ‘realistically’ and being treated with realistic psychology. The world suffers from being examined too closely. It’s mythic and spiritual and you get exactly enough worldbuilding for the mystical elements to have narrative meaning. Anything added to try to ‘explain’ has always made it poorer (ie: midichlorians) not richer.

Anyway, Ben is a complete narrative dead end now. If they were going to try to exploit him they would have done that instead of shunting him into the wings and killing him off. Now they will either have to drop him as quickly as possible and finish wiping him out of his own family’s story or they will try to hype up a bunch of remorseless villain content which makes no fucking sense and has nothing to do with who he actually is. He’ll be in the mask and have no discernable characterisation. They’ll try to make him Vader 2.0 the way the fanboys wanted.

Maybe if this fucking movie is enough of an embarrassment they might actually try to soften it and fix as much as they can with alternative interpretations, but who knows if they’d be allowed to do that. I don’t fucking care, they are all dead to me. I want them to stop making anything but we know that’s not going to happen.

[him-e]

There’s a gifset going around of the cast voting Reylo/Finnp0e and no surprise, they all voted Finnp0e and the gifset has like 70k notes. Reylo is always going to be that ship that’s fun for everyone to hate on, isn’t it

Did they ask Kelly Marie Tran, tho?

[nabenrrie]

daisy ridley on set of the force awakens // adam driver on set of the last jedi

(credit for gifs: x , x)

[chronicowboy]

let's be real here poe couldn't be a jedi because a lightsaber glows and everytime he turned it on he'd get distracted by the pretty glowing thing and try to touch and then get burnt

[brittany]

Adam and Daisy behind the scenes of ‘The Force Awakens’