Spoilers Ahead!
Early Frustrations:
I’m not necessarily an old school Star Wars fan and haven’t been invested long enough in the franchise, only jumping on the bandwagon for ‘The Force Awakens’ but I left this film confused and speechless and this wasn’t for all the right reasons either. In all honesty I was disappointed because Episode 7 had set a platform for the sequel to go any direction. With questions that had fanboys like myself, talking about speculations and theories and instead of these being answered, they were shrugged to the side.
The film was flipped on its head twice for me, one came with the introduction of the thought that in a moment of weakness, Luke Skywalker thought of killing Ben Solo in his sleep and this led to the creation of Kylo Ren. At the same time, this was equally matched with the death of Supreme Leader Snoke. These two can be counted as the same in a sense, to confirm that although Snoke had started to lure Ben to the dark side, Luke’s attempt on his life was the tipping point. Although I didn’t fancy how Snoke was killed off, it changed the direction of the film and made Kylo Reb ultimately the bad thing for the last part of the trilogy but the cost was no backstory for Snoke.
As shocking as his death was, the frustrating aspect of it was that this was the guy that seduced Kylo Ren and to watch him get owned the way he did was shocking. He did say that he knew everything that Ren was thinking but in the moment, he couldn’t sense that he was being betrayed – what?! I do have to admit his death and that of Luke finished what was the practices of old Jedi teachings and started of what would be, a clean slate. This did come as a surprise and it didn’t fall into a predictable storyline with Snoke being the new ‘Emperor’ and Kylo as ‘Vader’ but changed it up with Kylo killing his master and trying to undertake his own reign.
In saying that if we recall through this film, Kylo and Rey had moments where they were connected by the force which we later found out to be the efforts of Snoke and so with him out of the picture, how do the two have a force connection moment at the end of the film? (Just food for thought, I’m probably wrong about this) In all honesty before Snoke revealed his schemes, I thought that they were brother and sister (or somehow related/connected) which would make sense but that turned out to be wrong. Note: Snoke did use force lightning in this film which was a throwback to Palpetine who also had that trick up his sleeve.
The other big question going into the film was the origins of Rey and after all the theories and speculations, it was put to bed with the most left field of backstories of how she didn’t have any connective tissue to any of the characters in the franchise but she was just a nobody (that was somehow strong with the force). I think the move was different because it left room for the story to go any direction instead of being conformed to the known roster of characters that we are aware of. I still would’ve loved for those fan theories to be true, I mean Rey has an insane ability to tap into the force, she even had that force vision in Episode 7.
Thinking about it majority of my complaints came from the fact that I didn’t quite adapt to the approach taken by Johnson and the choices he made. Also maybe that I wanted more but in light of where the film ended, I think it was smart because it means that the next director (J.J. Abrams) can take the story forward, without having to be restricted to the limitations set. The story could go anywhere, obviously it will revolve around Rey and Kylo with Finn and Poe Dameron still to have some story arcs.
Character Mentions:
By the way did anyone notice how Finn and Rey had absolutely no (or too little) screen time together in this film, as Finn (after being friend zoned) has moved on to Rose. The question beckons whether Rose will be back and I think probably, her story arc ended the way Finn’s did in ‘The Force Awakens’ and I think that they will continue the relationship going. I thought she was a well established character and her sacrifice to stop Finn’s suicide attempt was noble; at the same time emotionally gripping.
Some characters I didn’t really care for, namely Phasma who was killed off in battle with Finn which was cool but due to the lacklustre of the character and the lack of screen time, nobody really cared at this point. It’s a shame because the character had so much potential but it wasn’t the best established character from the predecessor.
Breakdown:
Let’s talk about the beginning of the film, we start of at what was an epic space battle, one which we really didn’t get in ‘The Force Awakens’ and a lot of the story was set in the cosmos for this one. This was cool, speaking of space battle – we got a tease of what looked like Kylo attempting to kill Leia in the trailers and people shrugged it off as a misdirect. Although this was proven incorrect as Ren was in fact contemplating the decision when one of his fellow fighters took the shot. This was a big moment because it showed that Kylo hadn’t fully turned to the dark side. I thought this was smart because it gave us concrete evidence of what Snoke spoke of earlier, stating of Ren’s agony after he killed Han Solo (so for everyone who thought Kylo loved killing Han Solo, he didn’t actually – in his defence). To think about it, Snoke was a exposition type of character in the film until he died – RIP Supreme Leader who is wise to a certain point, which is limited to being betrayed by your apprentice (sorry guys, still a sensitive topic). Snoke really should have learnt from Palpetine, that a betrayal was going to take place, I mean Kylo is a unstable person.
Anyway, Kylo and Leia’s force connection was awesome even to the point of explosion. I appreciated the decision not to kill the character off like that but to give her the ability to showcase her new found force ability, this meant that Carrie Fisher was sent off properly. I appreciated the screen time we had the General Organa, she was very much prominent in this film and that scene with Luke and the force connection they had was so touching.
I would like to say that the trailers had an influence on my viewing, I can recall waiting for scenes and this affected how I perceived moments in the film. Specifically when the support carriers ran out of gas and were taken out one by one until the final ship of the Resistance remained. I kept on thinking but what about the land battle sequences we saw. I think with this film compared to ‘Rogue One’, majority of what we saw in the trailers were actual footage from the film, which will be interesting to see what didn’t make the final cut.
I liked how for Rey’s story arc in this film, we picked up right where ‘The Force Awakens’ left us and Luke’s reaction to receiving his old lightsaber was gold. In fact Rey’s whole time on Ahch-To was surreal, we got to see meet a stubborn Luke who was not willing to comply and a bundle of joy in the form of Porgs. That scene with Chewie trying to eat a cooked one in front of their fellow species was so cute. We also got to meet the caretakers of the island who I’m pretty sure hate Rey at this point for ruining their island. The character interaction with this ‘ewok’ type creatures brought for some humour – kudos Johnson.
We got to see survival skills from Luke which involved a blue milk shout out as well as fishing and we also got to see how he got to island by ‘x wing’ – a throwback to the original trilogy. Speaking of the trilogy, this was topped with Luke and Chewie meeting as well as a visit from Yoda which we’ll get to because that was another important moment going forward but can we talk about Rey tapping into the force. Her and Kylo’s interactions were something else and proved to be memorable and to see Luke catching the two holding hands via the force was great. Clearly if anything we found out that Rey is strong with the force, obviously it needs to be harnessed better but the fact that the force called her to the original temple was epic.
At the same time the dark side was also calling her and this was cool because the novelisation for ‘The Force Awakens’ hinted at this with Snoke calling to Rey (in her end battle with Ren). We also found out that Luke had stopped tapping into the force altogether, so all those theories of how Luke used the force to turn on R2-D2 in the last one was debunked. I liked the master and padwan element of the story and the humour that came with it. Also the other theory of Rey being a decent of Skywalker was thrown out the month. Luke didn’t know who she was, so she’s definitely not his daughter – I think that’s been established, unless that’s Luke’s love child but let’s not go there.
I think that Rey and Luke going at it both in verbal accusations and physical confrontations was cool to watch. Rey being full of hope and Luke not wanting to try again due to his past failures. I think it was cool how what started off as a glimpse of the events that unfolded which led to the burning of the Jedi Academy. Slowly coming to light and truth finally came out. This I think resembled the way that Rey approached Kylo, calling him monster to begin with and then going to fight along side him and see a hopeful future in his cards and actually opening up to him. One things for sure, Rey is definitely powerful, even Luke could tell – her lightsaber wielding and force abilities were epic.
The R2-D2 and Luke scene on the Falcon was awesome, seeing R2 go off at Luke the way that he did and also using the old Princess Leia message to Obi Won was a nice touch. Another interesting thing to note is that we are yet to see ‘The Knights of Ren’ either that’s been scrapped or they’re still to come. I think it was smart not to have them in this film especially with the introduction of Snoke’s royal guard.
Admiral Holdo’s introduction brought some conflict specifically for the character of Poe. I thought this was a cool thing because it was the first time in this trilogy that there has been some resistance within ‘The Resistance’. It started with Poe disobeying orders and trying to be a hero but our new favourite x-wing pilot, had to learn the hard way to follow instructions. I think at first you’re meant to dislike the character in a sense because she seemed to opposing the characters we had been introduced to but as the story unraveled, plans become clearer and character motives.
That was all for this part of the Spoiler Review. Join me again for the second part and we will discuss in-depth all things The Last Jedi. In the mean time what did you think of the latest Star Film film, was there something that I missed? Comment below, I would love to hear from you!
raviprasadwrites 