It’s been two years since THE
LAST JEDI arrived in movie theaters. With the release THE RISE OF SKYWALKER
just a few days away, it seems fitting that I should finally write a review of THE
LAST JEDI. I preface all of this by saying that I have been a Star Wars fan for
forty years. The first movie I ever saw in movie theatres was the original STAR
WARS. I still own all of my original
Star Wars toys that I played with as a kid. I spent more than three hours
waiting in line for tickets to see THE PHANTOM MENACE when it was first
released and that movie was the first movie I ever watched more than twice when
it was still in theatres during its initial theatrical run. When THE FORCE
AWAKENS was first released, I spent the entire day before seeing the film in a
movie theatre with my brother watching a 24-hr marathon of the previous six
films. While I wished that there would have been a moment in THE FORCE AWAKENS that re-united Luke, Han, and Leia, the
end of THE FORCE AWAKENS provided plenty of hope and excitement about what was
to happen next in the series.
Like that sign hanging above
Hell in The Inferno, “Abandon All Hope Ye Who Enter Here,” that all changed
when I watched THE LAST JEDI. We had purchased our tickets for that movie nearly
a month before it opened and watched it in a sold-out theatre. Anticipation
hovered in the theatre like early morning fog in the Smoky Mountains. An hour before
the movie started, we spent time playing Star Wars trivia and watching a Star
Wars costume contest. But finally, the lights dimmed, and THE LAST JEDI
started. We watched in rapture as the fleet of The First Order (which should
have been decimated after the destruction of Starkiller base) bore down upon
the secret hidden base of the Resistance fighters. The mood was tense and
dramatic. Then a lone Tie-Fighter appeared, seemingly to stand against the
oncoming fleet. It was Poe Dameron! But, seconds later, the excitement that
pulsed through that theatre completely evaporated when Poe made a “your mama”
joke with General Hux. There were a few chuckles, but that was it.
Soon after everyone watched
in devout rapture as Rey approached Luke Skywalker with his father’s
lightsaber, the weapon he lost in Cloud City along with a hand. Luke took the
saber, paused, and then chucked it over his shoulder. A man sitting with his
daughter and son in front of me audibly yelled “What the f*#%?!!!” His words
were echoed by many others throughout the theatre. Instead of getting better
from that point on, things just got worse.
The previous installments of
Star Wars fit together. The films built upon each other. Sure there was some hokeyness.
There was also some terrible dialogue (“I hate sand”). However, each of the previous eight movies fit
together. They were a part of an established universe with a set of defined
rules. Even though THE FORCE AWAKENS was kind of weak and basically a re-hash
of STAR WARS but with different characters, that movie has an overall feeling
of being a Star Wars movie. It introduced new characters and situations, yet,
it felt a part of the Star Wars universe. Typical of J.J. Abrams, the movie
also set up all kinds of questions that it didn’t answer. But, with this being
the first movie in a “trilogy,” it was expected at least some of those
questions would be answered in the next installment. But instead of answering
any of those questions and actually continuing the Star Wars saga, THE LAST
JEDI ignored almost everything that had happened in the previous films
(particularly THE FORCE AWAKENS) and instead became set on “defying
expectations.” Instead of watching a Star Wars movie, we were given a constant
stream of “gotcha” moments that might be appropriate in murder mystery comedy,
but not a Star Wars movie.
THE FORCE AWAKENS could have
easily been entitled THE SEARCH FOR LUKE SKYWALKER. The main plot of the movie
was all about getting this missing piece of a map that would allow whoever had
the whole map to find Luke Skywalker. After years of waiting (and especially
after teasing the audience at the end of THE FORCE AWAKENS), audiences finally
were able to see Luke Skywalker and the first thing he does is throw his
father’s lightsaber away. The character in THE LAST JEDI was not Luke
Skywalker. Luke Skywalker was a hero of the Rebellion who became a Jedi. THE
LAST JEDI would have audiences believe that the man who refused to give into
his anger and strike his father down did not continue to grow and instead
regressed into something less than he was before and attempt to murder his own
nephew. You can talk about “subverting expectations” and making “bold” choices
all you want, but anyone who has been a Star Wars fan since before 2015 knows that
the person posing as Luke Skywalker in THE LAST JEDI was not Luke Skywalker.
And what about the montage-like segments with Rey following Luke around; they
look like a montage from a low-budget 1980s movie from him milking that alien
for green milk to jumping around on giant stilts to go spearing for fish. It’s
horrible
Then there’s the death of
Admiral Ackbar and Leia Poppins in space. During a not-so-climatic space
battle, the forces of the First Order decimate most of the remaining forces of
the Resistance. Keylo Ren comes close to shooting the command ship, but then
senses his mother, General Solo, is on board. However, others under his command
do not and blast away at the ship’s bridge. Almost the entire remaining
leadership is blown into the vacuum of space, including both Admiral Ackbar and
General Leia. Fan favorite from RETURN OF THE JEDI, Ackbar’s death isn’t even
acknowledged except in a quick throwaway line. Not only that, but in the two
years since THE LAST JEDI arrived in theatres it has been revealed that Rian
Johnson and his team used the character one last time for an off camera joke.
In the same scene where
Ackbar is killed, General Leia is swept into space. As her body begins to
freeze and crystallize, her hand suddenly starts to twitch and then her eyes
open and she flies herself back to the ship. When I saw the movie in theatres,
the audience burst out laughing at this moment. It was incredible; not because
it was bold or revealed anything about Leia’s character but because how dumb it
was. In terms of plot, the sequence does nothing. Viewers are led to believe
that Holdo’s crazy scheme later in the movie was all her doing, but then it’s
revealed (“gotcha” again) that it was something she and Leia had discussed. So,
in terms of plot, what purpose did blowing up the bridge of the Resistance ship
actually serve? How did it move things along? Well, in all honesty, other than
to kill some other characters (such as Ackbar) off screen, it serves no real
purpose.
Which sums up the entire
movie of THE LAST JEDI: it’s only real purpose is that it doesn’t seem to have
any purpose other than killing off or completely changing favorite characters.
There’s Luke and Ackbar. THE LAST JEDI also turns Chewie into a vegetarian.
Then there are the villains. THE FORCE AWAKENS brought us Captain Phasma and
Snoke as two of the leaders of the First Order. THE LAST JEDI unceremoniously
kills off both Phasma and Snoke and turns the other major leader (besides Kylo
Ren) of the First Order, General Hux, into pure comic relief.
I could go on and on about
how bad THE LAST JEDI is and how it has decimated Star Wars. For instance, while
liquid fuel has sporadically had a place in Star Wars, it was never a crucial
factor. However, in THE LAST JEDI liquid fuel (and the lack of it) turns the
movie (and possibly any future Star Wars films) from being an exciting action
adventure in space into a two-and-a-half hour car chase through space.
There’s about a forty-minute
subplot to a casino planet that serves no real purpose and could have been
completely axed from the movie (the place is called Canto Blight and blight is
the right word). Instead, viewers are presented with lectures on the evils of
capitalism while the heroes rescue some alien horses, but do nothing for the
slave children the come in contact with. The Knights of Ren that were talked
about so prominently in THE FORCE AWAKENS are never seen. Rey’s “training” with
Luke consists of only two lessons over the course of just a few days and by the
end of that time, Rey has become even more powerful than Luke. C-3POs red arm
is gone and replaced with his classic golden one.
Then there are the classic
moments that had been in every Star Wars movie (except Rogue One), that are
absent in THE LAST JEDI. There is no lightsaber duel (there’s the red samurai
fight scene, but that’s not a lightsaber duel). The Whilhelm scream is not used
in the movie. And the “I’ve got a bad feeling about this,” is never heard (Rian
Johnson claims BB8 says it, but that’s not a line of actual spoken dialogue and
is just another way for him to be pretentious).
There are some moments in THE
LAST JEDI that feature some great cinematography, but these moments would be
better off seen in Rian Johnson’s version of a Terrence Malick flick instead of
in a Star Wars movie.
It’s been two years since THE
LAST JEDI was released. The movie changed Star Wars forever, but not for the
better. Instead, with the release of THE RISE OF SKYWALKER, the franchise is on
the verge of imploding. There will be some good things to come out of the Disney
Star Wars (such as THE MANDALORIAN). However, for all intents and purposes,
Disney has decimated the Star Wars universe with THE LAST JEDI and the
franchise will never be able to recover from the damage that has been done.
