Star Wars: The last Jedi dir. by

19 December 2017


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I’m afraid to say that I am one of the people who were disappointed by The Last Jedi. The one word description I can give of it is “mess”. That’s pretty much the first comment I made about it, and that is still my verdict after a few days. I’m so disappointed!

And all the more so because there is so much that I should have loved in this film. Rey’s origin, her parents. Loved that. I’m always up for Show Spoiler ▼

.

I loved the interactions between her and Luke, between her and Kylo Ren. But the film undercut itself somehow, and made me less invested in their story than I should have been.

Part of me thinks that the reason I was so underwhelmed is because it is so much easier to set up an intriguing storyline/mystery than it is to reveal things. Answers are very rarely as satisfying as you’d think. So The Force Awakens got to do all the fun hinting and setup, where as Last Jedi had to provide answers. Always a tricky job.
And maybe that is part of the reason, but I think a bigger part is that it was too long and saggy and for so much of the film I was wondering what the point was. And also the humour did not work. I’m not saying I didn’t find it funny, I just mean that it one-liners and jokes ruined the emotion of scenes for me. And was that milking scene there for any reason?

I’ve been skimming other people’s reviews and thoughts and I am so not on board with the so-called-fan-boys who think that the the legacy of Star Wars has been damaged, because I thought that the central theme of the film was a great one. People make mistakes. Doesn’t matter if they are jedi masters or pilots. Mistakes get made. That’s part of life, it is what you learn from those mistakes that is the important thing. You know, as Rocky said, It’s about how hard you can get hit1 and keep moving forward; how much you can take and keep moving forward. That’s a much better storyline than look hey, this guy comes from an important family, he must be important too.

And I really appreciated that there were plenty of women and POC in the rebellion this time around. I liked the Rose character, but that whole sub-story annoyed me so much. It was so pointless and just what!?! I mean, I get the message the film was trying to get across, and it is an important one. But, it just felt like a side-quest to me. I was so uninvolved and uninvested in that find the code-master segment.

I did like the pay-off from it Show Spoiler ▼

but as a film plot it didn’t work for me.

It is so strange, because there are so many elements to The Last Jedi that should have had me loving this film. I should be squeeing over those horse-type thingies, but nope. Their faces were weirdly human, the plot didn’t make sense, wouldn’t the security forces have just shot them to hell and back? And those kids who helped would have had the shit beaten out of them. I should’ve loved the crystal fox things.

So many should haves and missed moments.

I’m disappointed. But really glad that other people are loving it. Maybe if I rewatch it my opinion will change? I’m a bit worried that all my problems will grow even bigger though.


  1. I’m substituting get hit for make a mistake, you get that right?  

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2 Responses

  1. As you know, I really enjoyed the film. Went and saw it again this past Saturday and my feelings about it actually went up. Being able to just watch it without the “will I like this or won’t I” feelings made it fun, as did taking friends who had not seen it.

    I don’t get too worked up about the answers that were revealed in this one, especially because the films have set up a long history of lies and half truths, which the Jedi are famous for. I am not at all convinced that the “reveal” of Rey’s parents was anything but her fears seen by Kylo Ren. If it ends up being true, I’m okay with that because it solidifies the idea they tried to set up here that the force is not some bloodline only thing, but at the same time I think there are ways for them to keep that message and still reveal something about Rey’s actual parentage/origin in the next film.

    I’m really curious now whether or not they are going to try to wrap up this story line and these characters with this trilogy, or if the next film will just be a summary of sorts and lead into the next trilogy that has been given to writer/director Rian Johnson.

    I do think all the talk of this film, or this trilogy thus far, ruining Star Wars is a little silly. One could sit and point out SO MANY ways that The Last Jedi mirrors Empire Strikes Back, for one thing. I do like that they appear to be trying to make the story grow and change, but I felt Johnson did a nice job of much more subtly honoring the previous movies than Abrams did with TFA, whose homage was just to frequent and too obvious. I loved what they did with Luke Skywalker’s story line here, and I hope we get to see more of him as a force ghost in the next film.
    Carl V. Anderson´s last blog post ..Favorites of 2017

    • Fence says:

      I’m delighted to report that I went again today and enjoyed it much more second time around. It won’t rank as one of my favourite Star Wars films, and I still don’t like the way Hux was made to look so stupid as I don’t think it makes your baddies scary and threatening, but I certainly wasn’t as annoyed by parts of it, and had a lot more fun.

      So relieved! :)

      I agree that Rey’s parentage could still go either way, although I would prefer if she came from nowhere, but either could work.
      I did love Luke’s journey, even first time around, and I got to appreciate it more this time. I also spotted that Rey took the Jedi books which I hadn’t noticed on my first watch. So Yoda was telling the truth when he told Luke that she had everything she needed :)