Havok wrote:
You mean like how Luke learned to use a lightsaber to block blaster bolts on his first attempt or used the Force to blow up the Death Star?
Lucas avoided showing Luke fighting with Vader in Ep 4, showed him losing to Vader despite having some training in Ep 5. We became aware about the limitations of Luke's skills in the OT.
We did not see any limitations to Rey's skills in TFA. She could pretty much do whatever she wanted with the force with no training.
You mean like how you were immediately invested Darth Vader's that you didn't know was even going to exist?
Vader have no character arc set up for him in Ep 4. Ben Solo have a character arc set-up for him in TFA.
ANH: One Stardestroyer, a hallway full of Stormtroopers, Bad guy in black who chokes guys, a few Stormtroopers on a desert planet.
You're an idiot if you can't see the subtext in EP 4. The Empire was a threat because their presence could be felt everywhere. They were an empire that pretty much control most of the Galaxy, with backwater planets having a garrison and two Stardestroyers in orbit. The Rebels were shown to be a group that HAD to remain hidden from the Empire as an insurgency as opposed to a rival faction like the CIS.
How the fuck exactly did the Empire in ANH show how powerful it was before the Death Star that made it soooo impactful to you?
The fact that the only meaningful rebellion were limited to hidden bases? The fact that the destruction of Yavin was portrayed as a do or die battle for the Rebels? The fact that Solo made an remark that the Empire had massive number of ships aside from the Death Star? The First Order and the Resistance were portrayed as two proxy war factions.
However the First Order seems to openly embrace it's roots in the Dark Side, while the Empire, though run by a Sith, was still just a massive bureaucracy. Think of the First Order as an evil Rebel Alliance.
And how is this threatening as a villain faction? Half of the Galaxy remains under the control of a Republic, with a pretty decent navy that required SKB to threaten them. With the loss of SKB, it does not seem like the New Order have any major surprise up their sleeves that makes them a major threat to the New Republic.
It's amazing how you can't see the parallels that actually exist that you whine about, yet whine that all that can possibly happen is more parallels.
It doesn't answer my question. Why should I be interested in a parallel storyline?
WHO CARES?! You won't recognize them.
How about there isn't any meaningful themes?
Wait wait wait. Are you saying, they DIDN'T wrap up a 3+ movie story in the first movie?! What jerks!
No, I am saying they are making a TV pilot episode as opposed to a movie. Throwing lots of mysteries is a good way to get viewers hooked, but that does not mean it will create a decent story. It's almost like the TV show Lost, where the mystery is the only thing that keeps the showing going, even though the writers have zero clue what's behind the mystery.
A story isn't merely about questions and answers.
Yeah, you're right. Who cares that Luke essentially failed in learning from Yoda, Obi-Wan and his father and got his Academy slaughtered. Who cares about Rey possibly becoming the first of a new breed of Jedi or possibly falling herself. Who cares about Kylo Ren and whether he can be redeemed and reconcile with his mother after killing her husband, his own father. Or with Chewie. Or Luke. There's probably noone at all that wants to know about the Knights of Ren. Or Snoake or Poe or R2 and Threepio. What are Disney and Lucasfilm thinking?! None of those could POSSIBLY make good stories at all.
Those things don't necessarily makes good stories. How does finding out about background information about the origins of some evil sect makes a major story? Moreover, all those stories you are talking about have already been told once. If I am looking for something different, why should I be invested in Disney's Star Wars?
At the least some of the EU stories tried to be more creative than TFA.
Your head seems extremely hollow to me.
Yeah, because not liking a narrative rehash makes someone hollow in the head.
Knife wrote:Oh, it's most certainly about Rey learning the Force, that's a given.
What more did she need to learn from Luke? She could easily best someone who spent years training to be a Jedi in a matter of days. The only thing left for her would be learning to master some ultimate skills that could kill Snoke or something. That isn't interesting in my opinion.
I whole heartedly disagree that Rey 'mastered the force' by default. She is powerful and a natural like Anakin was, and the Force AWAKENED and worked through her but in no more miraculous way than getting Luke to land a shot in a million against the deathstar. Yeah, she beat Kylo who himself was a half trained boy who would have gotten his clocked cleaned by an PT Jedi. Sure, he is strong too, but obviously not fully trained and only looks impressive next to 'normal' people. Not to mention gut shot by Chewie and a good shot that Fen got in with Luke's saber.
If someone does not need the training to defeat the main antagonist of a film, then it makes the whole story weaker because there isn't anything left to threaten the heroes. It's like JJ and his stupid idea about the magic blood. If heroes could be easily revived, then we don't need to fear for their lives.
As far as Luke goes, he's just a Yoda character, and really only came into the trilogy an hour earlier than Yoda did in the OT. That doesn't worry me much. I would hope that Luke see's the error of 'disappearing' when training Rey, that she must accept that she might fail but still try as a Jedi. Luke really was a transitional character, now needs to set up a new Order with Rey.
Except Luke was a different character from Yoda. Luke was the leading protagonist as opposed to Yoda. People are interested in following Luke's journey more so than Yoda's. This makes writing any sequel with a different protagonist difficult, because the desire to explore Luke's story will easily overshadow Rey's. JJ simply pushed the burden to Rian Johnson.
Which is why they should actually explore in film the Sith (or whatever Kylo/Snoke are) and have Ren continue to fall and grow as a bad guy.
I totally get what they did with Ren. They were never going to make another really awesome character like Vader and any attempt was going to fall short and look cheap. Anything would have been labeled as a wannabe, so they actually seriously went with a wannabe. No they should explore that character and make him fall and become truly a frightening evil bad guy, not just a spoiled brat with issues.
Antagonist functions in stories as a foil to threaten the protagonist. If the antagonist required his own story to be a threat, then it weakens the tension of the story.
Furthermore, I dislike the notions of having to create a weaker villian because you could never recreate Vader in terms of on-screen presence. Plenty of Star Wars fans were fine with characters like Darth Maul and Darth Sidious even though they aren't as memorable as Vader. They could still function effectively as villains.
Kylo Ren is basically an upgraded version of a stormtrooper. He could easily kill Rebel mooks and unnamed Jedi with ease. However, the second he is faced with the new protagonist of Star Wars, he loses the fight. The lightsabre duel scene just showed just how much plot armour Rey has.
So yeah, this is the meat and the potatoes of it, isn't it? Luke's role seemed to be to remove Vader (one way or another) but not necessarily to reboot the Jedi. Not sure what 'mistakes' he made but obviously he screwed up.
It would be interesting if he 'took it easy' on Ben because of his parents. Saw that he might be falling but ignored it because he's Han and Leia's kid. Might explain some of the guilt and why he bailed. We've been bagging on the PT for years about the Jedi Rules and about their views on attachment, but this could be the flip side of it. Luke was too attached to Ben to notice and admit that he was falling and had to witness a massacre of his peeps. And because of that attachment could not bring himself to end Kylo at that point either.
I wonder if they will explore the idea that maybe Luke thought about letting the Order die. A lot of suffering has come from the last few decades from fallen Jedi, I wonder if they will explore the idea that without the Jedi these things would not happen and him removing himself from the galaxy as his reasons. It would be interesting. Then finding out that even with himself removed, evil marched on and Jedi are still needed.
Some of the old rules we mocked are still needed, new and old meshed together. Almost a rule of two for Jedi for training, instead of Luke training a whole group at once.
How much room is left for Rey in such a story? Rey's training as a Jedi would effectively serve as Luke's story as opposed to her story. Rey is a support character, not the main character.
