Last night I finally saw The Last Jedi.
So was it good?
Ok..This is Star Wars we are talking about. This a mythology that started on film instead of books or oral traditions or religion. It deserves a more broad discussion.
I have stated many times my dislike for The Force Awakens. I went to watch that movie full of nostalgia and left the theatre completely dissapointed and with mixed feelings. I wanted to love it. I really tried to defend it and excuse it. But after many viewings I just couldn’t. It was flashy and well shot. But the characters were stupid, the plot was just a rehash of A New Hope (Yes, I know that this argument has been repeated ad nauseum but it actually explains a lot). Also the liberal-feminist-SJW crap was annoying to no end. It shows that Disney doesn’t give two damns about the lore and mythology of Star Wars and just wanted to make another boring blockbuster to sell merchandising while having “Progressive points” with the millenials. Merchandising is not a bad thing at all but…this is Star Wars. It goes beyoned Toyetic crap. And nobody gives a shit about the filmmakers’ politics.
Yet I wanted to think that they did it only to make people excited about Star wars and in the sequel they will do a great Star Wars movie that will deserve to be with the better ones.”This is for the fans and the kids”, I thought. “Next one will learn and do a great movie”.
Then the trailer was released and I wasn’t excited. I don’t know why. I really wanted to love it but it was just meh. I still wanted to give it a try. But I wasn’t excited. I didn’t feel like going to the midnight showing but I still wanted to go the next weekend. Unfortunately, family issues got in the way and christmas arrived so I decided to wait until things got better. Finally last night went and watched it with my brother and mom.
So..was it good?
Depends. Do you want me to be nice or honest?
Nice answer: It was a very beautiful movie to watch. Every shot, the cinematographty, the art direction (sometimes), the action scenes, the CGI, the FX, the music and the editing were superb. It really is a masterpiece of visual storytelling. Also, while with TFA I was just thinking “really? they are going to do that AGAIN?”, and was getting upset for the lack of creativity and mediocrity, I enjoyed this movie much more. It is definitely a movie for the silver screen.
Honest answer: It was just OK-ish. Not a great movie. But this is star wars and needs to be great. It rehashed this time both elements from The Empire Strikes Back and The Return of the Jedi. They didn’t felt like homages but more like pastiches. It didn’t felt like a Star Wars movie. It felt like a clone of a Star Wars movie with Star wars characters in there.
Let’s go piece by piece:
The movie starts with the RebelsResistence fleeing from the EmpireNew Order and the latino-clone of Han solo, Poe Dameron, leading an attack. Then they exchange a very lame, dumb, unfunny joke about acting like a wrong call or something.
Ugh.
Then they attack the huge ship and la resistence flees but the New Empire chase them thru lightspeed. And the story goes on.
There are many sublopts at the same time: Mary Sue finally found Luke Skywalker and she gets trained because…something. Unimportant character that happens to be black meets fat diveristy asian chick and goes to Las Vegas to find a codebreaker to get into the empi…new order ship and deactive a wachamacallit thing. Leia it’s in a comma (more to that later) and a purple-haired gender studies teacher takes control and confronts patriarchy and tells Poe to check his privilege. Kylo vader has issues and connects to Mary sue blah blah yada yada *yawns*..you know what? go and check wikipedia’s page to see the full plot. Besides, I guess everybody have already seen it by now.
The problem I have with The Last Jedi…are actually many:
It has that annoying Marvel-esque humor: the lame joke at the beginning, Finn waking up akwardly, the nuns at the island where luke lives and so on. Some where funny, some where…dumb. Star wars had comedy, yes. But it was more classy and didn’t feel juvenile.
…okay not always
The characters are dumb and useless. Finn and diversity girl are lame and uninteresting. Finn already had that issue since TFA. It was just there to give Han solo and Rey a funny buddy. Saddly his backstory it’s actually great. A storm trooper that deserts the empire..er, New Order…you know what? fuck it! I’ll call it the Empire because that’s what it is. It’s such a rip-off that doesn’t make it interesting to remember its real name. It has great material and could make an interesting complex character. But no. He is just there to make akward jokes and have “progressive points”.
Speaking of progressive points, Diversity girl is so fucking boring! why is she there? why should we care about here? aaawww she freed the llama-horses…so what!? oh yeah her sister was in the Rebel..er, Resistence…you know what? fuck it! I’ll call it the Rebels because that’s what it is. It’s such a rip-off that doesn’t make it interesting to remember its real name. Like Finn, she is just there to tickle another box in the “Diversity to-do list” and feel like they are saving the world or something.
Also..there are lots of beautiful, great asian actresses…
…why this one?
oh yeah…
😛
Poe Dameron is the only one that makes you root for him. Too bad that he is an AGENT OF THE PATRIARCHY! Thanks goodness that we have purple-haired-maybe-lesbian Gender Teacher Holdo to put him in his place! Yeah! Take that you agent for the patriarchy! go to your room and check your privilege!
holy shit! I am seeing double! Four vice-admiral Holdos!
Rey is the same fucking Mary sue she always is. She is sooo strong with the force that she doesn’t need training. She can even defeat a Jedi like Luke without training! she can swim! she can shoot spaceships! she can fight againts an army with a light saber because why not! I was hoping they will show her like a hero in training, that has flaws and she overcomes those flaws. But no. She is perfect in any way because of course. At least, Daisy ridley is a great actress and is charismatic. Too Bad she is trapped in a boring useless character.
How about the classic ones? Chewie is just there…R2-D2 has a nice nostalgic scene and that’s it. C3PO is…just there too.
Now about Luke Skywalker. Mark Hamil does a great job but the way they treated the character is a spit on the lore and the skywalker mythology. He is grumpy and an asshole. He is not the son of anakin or the jedi that destroyed the empire. He is just an old hermit that hates the Jedi. Now, that doesn’t necessary means is a bad angle for a character evolution. But there’s no real motivation behind his change and doesn’t fit with the way the character was shown before. It feels that they made him this way to make way for the new characters and take him out of the way. Feels disrespectful.
And Leia…*sighs* First of all, Carrie fisher did a very good job and that the character is not longer a princess or a queen…that’s fine. But just like the rest of the female characters, they made her somehow invencible and wonderful just because..she is a woman? I know it sounds awful but after seeing how Han solo didn’t had a good evolution and neither Luke, the fact the she is the only one of these movies that faired well feels unbalanced. Why not making Han solo a general or captain too along her wife? why separate them? why did luke got in hiding (and yet somehow left a map? come on! that’s dumb). But the worst thing they did with her character is…this:
WHAT THE FUCK?!
Oh that’s another thing by the way. The Force in this movie is all over the fucking place. In past movies, the force was more mystical and yes supernatural but it felt natural. Here it can make EVERYTHING! It felt less like a force of nature and more like fucking Harry Potter: flying in space, casting lightnings (as a ghost!), using it as skype….
Another thing they keep saying about the movie is that “it took a lot of risks”.
WHAT RISKS?!
Everytime the movie was going to do something bold and amazing it had cold feet and threw it away. For example, the Flying Leia scene. It’s a shame Carrie Fisher passed away and it was the oportunity to give her a proper send off. It would have been more decent, sad but beautiful to let her die, killed by her son, and kept with the way Solo died. Would have been shocking but memorable…specially considering that she won’t return for Episode IX anyway. But no. She wakes up and becomes Mary Poppins.
I bet that when Episode 9 appears they will show her death with a dumb crawl text or make her CGI and kill her somehow. or killing her off-camera. Either of these options are dumb.
Also Finn and Diversity girl are so hollow and uninteresting that nobody cares about them. But in the third act, we see Finn decided to sacrify himself so the Rebels can escape. In that moment I thought that Finn giving his life would have been shocking but noble. This character that didn’t do a single interesting thing in these movies, will have his moment and become a martyr. That would have been amazing. But no. Diversity girl push him away! “oh” I thought “then maybe she is gonna take his place..and give her life just like her sister did! wow! how noble and poetic!”.
Nope. Both live.
So these two characters had a chance to have a beautiful and bold moment and in the last moment Disney said “lol no”. what a bunch of crap.
But the worst..is Luke’s death. Now let’s not fool ourselves. Since the moment this new trilogy was announced we knew that Luke will die any given moment. Just like qui-gon jin, just like obi-wan, just like anakin, they will give their lives in a chivalrous and honorable way. When Luke appeared and faced his nephew and said “if yous strike me with all your hate, I’ll be with you”. I had chills. This is coming full circle. “when you left I was the aprentice now I am the master”. And then Kylo stabs him and…nothing.
In reality, luke projected himself from his tiny planet (???) so he was never really there. What a fucking coward. So I thought, “ok fine he will live, train rey and die in the third”.
Nope he died. Just like that.
At least freakin’ Yoda closed his eyes and died in peace. Luke just poofed.
This character is the backbone of the saga. We watched the prequels because we wanted to know about his father and we waited for these movies to know about his descendants. But nope. nada. zero. zippy-di-doo-da. He is grumpy and dies just because. It’s a spit in the face to the lore and mythology of the saga.
It’s insulting bullshit.
There are also things that everytime they happen just made me think “why?”. The Not-Las Vegas plotline is so useless and doesn’t go anyway. It’s pure filler and a waste of time just to give these two blank characters something to do and create false tension and give an anti-capitalist and enviromental message (fuckin hypocrites!) The killing of Snoke and Phasma…why were those characters there in the first place? Snoke created the new empire. Ok fine. But who is he? Where does he come from? how he got there? Nothing. He is just there to be a replacement of the emperor and, bam! it dies. Captain Phasma..what is so special about her? “ooh ooh is the first female trooper!”…ok what else? nothing. and she dies in a very unimaginative way. Bah. This is not bold or risky. It’s nothing. It’s waste of time.
There are many things more I can say about it but I am tired of it. I really wanted to see a great Star Wars movie. But it was dissapointing. It had great ideas. But everytime it aproaches them, it throws them away. After 2 hours and a half, it feels like a waste. The Last Jedi is the movie that could-been but wasn’t.
It’s amazing the number of op-eds defending the movie (none the less mostly from liberal publications that have orgasms with the feminist crap) but also from film publications that want to defend the movie. Their conclusions are that no, the movie is great. It’s us the fans that are wrong. You see, we have expectations! how dare we!
Now yes, there are the rabbid fanboys that won’t be satisfied with anything and make dumb on-line petitions. But there are lots of us that like the Star Wars mythology and just want it to be respected. That’s it. But when Disney decides to telll us to “leave the past behind and move on” which is a cute way to say “shut up and enjoy our movies fanboys!”, we cannot accept it. We criticized the Prequels because their good ideas had bad execution. We criticize these new movies because they are conceptually mediocre.
Take for the example “The Hobbit” films. Are they bad movies? No. They are well done and entertaining. So why the hate from the fans? Of course we have the annoying fanboys that treat it like a religion but there are also the ones that just want these works to be treated with respect. The Lord of the Rings trilogy by Peter jackson are loved because he treated the material with respect while making great movies. Guillermo del Toro’s treatment of the Hobbit was going to be the same, making a great movie about the hobbit (giving it in two parts), respecting the lore and mythos of the book and its universe. Instead, New Line Cinema made three movies full of nothing with a pasion-less Peter jackson. They felt like movies made in a conveyor belt. They work as blockbusters but not as a Tolkien-inspired movies.
TFA and TLJ are the same. They don’t care about the material. Disney cares about keeping them in the mainstream and sell toys while pushing their political agends. TFA was mediocre. Rogue one was better because it dived in the lore (enough to ignore the patched storytelling and wooden characters). TLJ tries to be bold and interesting and it fells on the way. Boring characters, disrespect to the original mythology and a story that promises a lot and delivers too little. Like “The Hobbit” they work as blockbusters, but not as Star wars movies.
Star Wars is just not “a bunch of sci-fi movies”. It goes beyond that. This is a saga that was created by a man, George Lucas, as a homage to the comics and serials he loved as a kid. It was a love letter to old tales and sci-fi pulp. It arrived at the right place and the right time, when the world was in the need of new stories and tales to dream about. It was a huge cultural impact. Many say “oh come one those movies didn’t age well”. I disagree. Yes many cinematographic techniques may seem outdated (a reason why lucas made the changes), but you cannot judge a 30+ year old movie with the same standards of today. It’s absurd. The prequels mistakes are many but they respect the lore of the saga. Yes, the dialogue needed a lot of work and lacked more excitment and has fucking Jar jar, but they bring more to the Star Wars mythology than these 2 last movies.
It lacked a more diverse cast? yeah but remember that it was the 70s and there were the explotaition genres so many studios were weary of casting actors of different races. A dumb reason, I agree. But it is what it is. With that said, Lando Calrissian and Leia were loved not because they were “diverse” but because they were well written. Star wars was a saga for boys because his creator (heavens forbid!) was a boy. But guess what? It was so well made that it was loved, and I mean LOVED by girls too! Do you really think that girls were felt outcasted for it? of course not! They loved leia. They loved Darth vader. They loved Luke. The prequels had more women and different races in the movies but Disney wants you to believe otherwise. These last movies, have this disgusting new trend where white males are EEEEEEEVIL and any other race or gender is AWESOME. It’s not an accident that the Rebels are leaded by women while white men are in the background. This is not equality. This is misandry and bullshit racism. George Lucas’ works had less women and other races but the few that were there were truly equal. Disney doesn’t know shit.
Lucas beated Disney in the diversity department a long time ago
And after watching The Last Jedi, I made a decision: I won’t watch Episode IX.
I don’t care anymore. I am done.
Why should I? Disney doesn’t care about the lore of Star Wars so why I should care about their liberal-arts crap-o-rama? They don’t need my money. They can make a mediocre star wars movie and make millions. I’ll download it when it is available.
I won’t watch the Han solo movie or the new non-skywalker trilogy they are planning. Star Wars Episodes 1 to 6 are the true Star Wars because they were made by his creator, George Lucas. Some better than others and yes the prequels have lots of flaws but it’s what Lucas created for better or worse. Disney will just keep making expensive fan fics that don’t give a damn about Star wars. They had the chance to carry the torch properly and failed.
Disney didn’t destroy my childhood. My childhood is just fine. Besides I didn’t become a Star Wars fan until I was in college. What it did destroyed was a beautiful cinematic mythology just for the sake of progressiveness and toys.
Star Wars is over. And will never come back.
Bob's Blog 
3 thoughts on “Disney’s The Last Jedi review”