Star Wars: The Last Jedi (Post-release)

What did you think of Star Wars: The Last Jedi?

  • It was great. Loved it. Don't miss it at the theaters.

    Votes: 154 26.6%
  • It was good. Liked it very much. Worth the theater visit.

    Votes: 135 23.4%
  • It was okay. Not too pleased with it. Could watch it at the cinema once or wait for home video.

    Votes: 117 20.2%
  • It was disappointing. Watch it on home video instead.

    Votes: 70 12.1%
  • It was bad. Don't waste your time with it.

    Votes: 102 17.6%

  • Total voters
    578
1/ The Rebels beat the Empire then sent the remnants away (where?) so they could regroup and come back 30 years later?

The New Republic didn't send them away. The remnants of the Empire retreated on their own to the uncharted regions and there is where Snoke organized them into the First Order.

2/ That same Empire/Order now had the money backing or resources to create a whole NEW Empire with bigger and better weapons - and no one noticed?

Ummm... yes, people noticed. Leia had been warning the New Republic leadership about the growing threat of the First order for years. But the generally pacifistic leadership left her warnings unheeded to the point General Leia was all but ostracized and was basically leading the Resistance on her own.

3/ The Rebellion became the new Republic but then just moved to a new Star System (for no good reason) and set up shop, disbanded their fleets, and took no notice whatsoever of any feasible threat from within or without their Galaxy?

They left Coruscant because that had been the seat of the Empire. The new Republic moved their governmental seat regularly... specifically to avoid having a "home world" like the Empire did. And again, YES... some did take notice of external threats... namely General Leia and the Resistance. that is literally why they existed.

4/ The Hero of the OT Luke Skywalker sets up a new Jedi order but muffs it and runs off to live like a hermit .. totally against everything he learned originally about persevering.

Yes.. and because he almost killed his own Flesh and Blood in a moment's weakness. I think if any of us almost put our own nephew/niece/child, whatever to death... it would make us stop and reevaluate if we deserve to live or not.

Also, this part was not in TFA... which is where you had focused your post thusfar.


5/ Said new Jedi order (over the space of 30+ years) seems to consist only of 6 people and all the roughly same age?....

on top of this we have the sheer level of coincidence going on in TFA?

Luke mentioned in TLJ that he took a DOZEN students on after the events of ROTJ. So... 13 potential jedi. He then tells us that Kylo slaughtered all but a few of those when Luke tried to kill him. So yeah... if you only have 1 true jedi and 12 students 30 years ago... and all but a few are killed, you're not gonna have very many trained jedi 30 years later, are you?

Perhaps that's why The Force chose Rey to be a jedi.
 
The New Republic didn't send them away. The remnants of the Empire retreated on their own to the uncharted regions and there is where Snoke organized them into the First Order.



Ummm... yes, people noticed. Leia had been warning the New Republic leadership about the growing threat of the First order for years. But the generally pacifistic leadership left her warnings unheeded to the point General Leia was all but ostracized and was basically leading the Resistance on her own.



They left Coruscant because that had been the seat of the Empire. The new Republic moved their governmental seat regularly... specifically to avoid having a "home world" like the Empire did. And again, YES... some did take notice of external threats... namely General Leia and the Resistance. that is literally why they existed.



Yes.. and because he almost killed his own Flesh and Blood in a moment's weakness. I think if any of us almost put our own nephew/niece/child, whatever to death... it would make us stop and reevaluate if we deserve to live or not.

Also, this part was not in TFA... which is where you had focused your post thus far.





Luke mentioned in TLJ that he took a DOZEN students on after the events of ROTJ. So... 13 potential jedi. He then tells us that Kylo slaughtered all but a few of those when Luke tried to kill him. So yeah... if you only have 1 true jedi and 12 students 30 years ago... and all but a few are killed, you're not gonna have very many trained jedi 30 years later, are you?

Perhaps that's why The Force chose Rey to be a jedi.


See how context can actually make the story stronger? I take it that all of this information about Leia and the Resistance came from ancillary sources like books and such. Had any of it been in the movie it most certainly could have given audiences context as to how and why these things were playing out the way they did.

With regards to Luke, I'm sure most people would hate themselves after something like that, but again it conflicts with what we know of Luke from Return of the Jedi. He spent that entire film redeeming Vader who was far more evil than Ben ever was. What could Ben have possibly done that was so bad that he couldn't be redeemed? Luke only attacked Vader when he was provoked by him and it was because he threatened to turn Leia. When he realized what he did he stopped himself and threw away his weapon and refused to give in to the Emperor. Again we are missing context in TLJ. Luke says Snoke got to Ben. So what? The Emperor succeded in turning Vader and he was able to come back to the light. What fundamentally changed in Luke where contemplating killing his nephew was even an option?



Again this idea was one that George Lucas came up with from The Phantom Menace days that actually changes the context of the Force itself and turns it from an Eastern idea of impartial metaphysics and into a concrete Western deity with a conscious will. If you're going to have a series you can't just change the structural rules halfway through to suit your poor writing choices. You can expand on the original ideas but to change the rules themselves only conflicts with what came before and will likely upend your fanbase who is following it based on the rules you established in the first place. Having established boundaries is what sets Star Wars apart from Star Trek. It's what sets Lord of the Rings apart from Harry Potter.

You can't change the rules halfway into the game and expect people to want to continue playing along. The Force can't be both things at once and work as a guiding element of the story. Either it's a deity of some kind that has a conscious will and can make choices of who can tap into it, or it's an impartial energy that can be accessed by people who are sensitive to it. Those two ideas are diametrically opposed to one another. It's the reason why people were so annoyed that Anakin was result of a virgin birth by the will of the Force in TPM and why the idea of a Chosen One and a prophecy seemed to not quite fit with what we experienced of Luke in the Original Trilogy. Besides, if the Force is a god of some kind with a will of it's own, because let's face it you can't have a will if you are not conscious, then why would it choose people to be able to tap into it's power rather than use that power for it's own ends? See how that idea muddies the waters?
 
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Just for S&G's I went back doing a bit of research between our conversations about TFA vs. TLJ.

TFA Premiered Dec. 18, 2015
TLJ Premiered Dec. 15, 2017

TFA Post Release thread contained 174 pages of discussion w/the last entry being on May 25, 2017 (so 1 year 6 months of discussion)
TLJ Post Release thread contains 170 pages of discussion and still going after only 4 months.

I am sure Disney made a buttload of money on TLJ, but more importantly, they have us (as fans on the RPF) talking about it even more than we did TFA. Even though the majority of the conversation revolves around negative views. We are analyzing, talking about, and thinking 4 times more about this film than we did TFA. If the old saying "No publicity is bad publicity", we are certainly keeping it a hot topic of conversation.

So, IMHO if you didn't like this film, to quote Disney's own script from TLJ "Let the past die, Kill it if you have to". We have let our voice be heard by Disney, perhaps it is time to let this one die, and focus on what we would like to or hope to see corrected in Episode IX discussion.

No disrespect intended to anyone or any viewpoint. And I am certainly not telling anyone to do or not do anything, I am just asking the question "are we doing what they hoped we would do by keeping this a hot topic? Are we giving them the reaction (positive or negative) they were looking for? Just a thought???
 
You bring up good points. Though I suspect that the ultimate guiding principle of Lucasfilm's philosophy on making these films is the almighty dollar. Fans expectations and opinions be damned. As long as there is money to be made that's all that truly matters to them.
 
The New Republic didn't send them away. The remnants of the Empire retreated on their own to the uncharted regions and there is where Snoke organized them into the First Order.



Ummm... yes, people noticed. Leia had been warning the New Republic leadership about the growing threat of the First order for years. But the generally pacifistic leadership left her warnings unheeded to the point General Leia was all but ostracized and was basically leading the Resistance on her own.



They left Coruscant because that had been the seat of the Empire. The new Republic moved their governmental seat regularly... specifically to avoid having a "home world" like the Empire did. And again, YES... some did take notice of external threats... namely General Leia and the Resistance. that is literally why they existed.



Yes.. and because he almost killed his own Flesh and Blood in a moment's weakness. I think if any of us almost put our own nephew/niece/child, whatever to death... it would make us stop and reevaluate if we deserve to live or not.

Also, this part was not in TFA... which is where you had focused your post thusfar.




Luke mentioned in TLJ that he took a DOZEN students on after the events of ROTJ. So... 13 potential jedi. He then tells us that Kylo slaughtered all but a few of those when Luke tried to kill him. So yeah... if you only have 1 true jedi and 12 students 30 years ago... and all but a few are killed, you're not gonna have very many trained jedi 30 years later, are you?

Perhaps that's why The Force chose Rey to be a jedi.
Almost none of that was explained or alluded to in the film. So for many people, those contexts don't exist.

I was under the impression (from Lukes words) that Luke did not have students 30 years ago; he took them on at the same time he took on kylo as apprentice.

I don't think we're told, on screen or in print how old Kylo was when Luke began to train, but that point marks the beginning of Luke's academy. It didn't happen in the wake of ROTJ. It much later, closer to the events in TFA.

Either way, poor storytelling. The first episode of Lost in Space is better than both the new Star Wars movies, and it's far from perfect at that.

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No the prequels are still poor movies. The thing that makes them better than the sequel trilogy is at least they had an overarching plot. But both trilogies are not very good.

Only Star Wars, The Empire Strikes Back, and Return of the Jedi are nearly flawless. Not perfect, but well constructed movies that have stood the test of time.
 
I’ve been gone a moment, did we cover this graflex?
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See how context can actually make the story stronger? I take it that all of this information about Leia and the Resistance came from ancillary sources like books and such. Had any of it been in the movie it most certainly could have given audiences context as to how and why these things were playing out the way they did.

Again, I think we're dealing with real world problems here. There is limited time (2-2.5 hrs max) in a typical film to tell your story. I said repeatedly, in the wake of TFA, that I wished the film had cut maybe 20 minutes of action sequences and replaced it with 20 minutes of exposition. I think it would have made a huge difference to all of the storytelling going forward. I, for one, hate the notion of "Oh, just read the novel/comic/web blog/tweets from JJ/whatever" to address issues relating to worldbuilding. Your story ought to be self-contained enough to do that on its own, without having a footnote that says "See, TFA: The Novelization for more." You also shouldn't be building "mystery" into this unless it's relevant to the story. Snoke's identity and how he managed to create the First Order isn't relevant to the story as a mystery. By that, I mean it's not a plot point or something that anyone in the films is trying to figure out. Therefore, there's zero reason to leave the audience in the dark about it, except for JJ's lazy "mystery box" BS as a means to manufacture audience interest, and a desire to keep the action sequences going instead. (Side note: one thing I actually really appreciate as a difference between TLJ and TFA is that TLJ bothers to take its time in telling the story it's trying to tell. One may dislike that story and the direction that it went, but at least the film isn't saying "NEVERMIND THAT, HERE'S RATHTARS!!!!! RUNFORYOURLIVES!!!!!!!!!!!!!").

So, yes, I think the new trilogy does have a major weak spot in terms of what it does to "set the table," so to speak. Hell, you could've done a wordier opening crawl and it would've helped tons.

That said, I think that, again, IF you can accept that the off-screen events happened as described, then it makes sense that our characters are where they are. The problem is in making the leap from the state of the galaxy at the end of ROTJ to the state of the galaxy at the start of TFA. Unlike the state between ROTS and ANH, TFA is seriously jarring in terms of "Whoa...how the hell did we end up here?" As I've said before, I blame JJ in a big, big way for that.

With regards to Luke, I'm sure most people would hate themselves after something like that, but again it conflicts with what we know of Luke from Return of the Jedi. He spent that entire film redeeming Vader who was far more evil than Ben ever was. What could Ben have possibly done that was so bad that he couldn't be redeemed? Luke only attacked Vader when he was provoked by him and it was because he threatened to turn Leia. When he realized what he did he stopped himself and threw away his weapon and refused to give in to the Emperor. Again we are missing context in TLJ. Luke says Snoke got to Ben. So what? The Emperor succeded in turning Vader and he was able to come back to the light. What fundamentally changed in Luke where contemplating killing his nephew was even an option?

TLJ explains that Luke had a vision of the future and Ben being this galactic tyrant. This is actually in keeping with what we know of him from the OT. Luke has always been someone who thought about the future at the expense of the present. Yoda says this to him when he reveals his own identity to Luke in ESB (The "Long have I watched this one" speech). It happens again to Luke when he races off to Bespin to save his friends -- based on a vision of the future and his desire to control it. I would argue that of all Luke's flaws, it makes perfect sense that this one would be his achilles heel and the thing that ultimately destroys the good he builds. (Plus, science fiction and fantasy have long treated prescience as a curse of sorts.) So, basically, IF Luke witnessed a sufficiently bad vision of the future, then it might make sense that he'd have his moment of weakness, only to immediately hate himself after it....but it's too late.

Again this idea was one that George Lucas came up with from The Phantom Menace days that actually changes the context of the Force itself and turns it from an Eastern idea of impartial metaphysics and into a concrete Western deity with a conscious will. If you're going to have a series you can't just change the structural rules halfway through to suit your poor writing choices. You can expand on the original ideas but to change the rules themselves only conflicts with what came before and will likely upend your fanbase who is following it based on the rules you established in the first place. Having established boundaries is what sets Star Wars apart from Star Trek. It's what sets Lord of the Rings apart from Harry Potter.

You can't change the rules halfway into the game and expect people to want to continue playing along. The Force can't be both things at once and work as a guiding element of the story. Either it's a deity of some kind that has a conscious will and can make choices of who can tap into it, or it's an impartial energy that can be accessed by people who are sensitive to it. Those two ideas are diametrically opposed to one another. It's the reason why people were so annoyed that Anakin was result of a virgin birth by the will of the Force in TPM and why the idea of a Chosen One and a prophecy seemed to not quite fit with what we experienced of Luke in the Original Trilogy. Besides, if the Force is a god of some kind with a will of it's own, because let's face it you can't have a will if you are not conscious, then why would it choose people to be able to tap into it's power rather than use that power for it's own ends? See how that idea muddies the waters?

By and large, I agree that you can't just up and change the rules mid-game....except when you can. But if and when you do it, you need to take the time to explain why the new rules work and should be treated as new rules or a newer understanding of the rules. For example, Lucas' introduction of "midichlorians." I hated this when it was introduced, and thankfully, it was left by the wayside immediately after. But the notion of the "will of the Force" or a dichotomy between the "cosmic" and "living" Force, I think, fits. Basically, I think the Force is bigger and more complex than was described in the OT or slightly expanded upon in the PT. The Clone Wars cartoon sort of dealt with this as well, but it's kind of a confusing portion of the show, and it's not really dwelt upon. Suffice to say that I think the notion of "balance" is really essential, and that a Force out of balance may in some ways "act" to rebalance itself. But this is less than, necessarily, turning the Force into a Western, anthropomorphic deity with sentience, with consciousness and clear will, and is perhaps more like how water will seek to find its own level (at least when gravity acts upon it). In that sense, water's "will" is to be level, but it's not like water is sitting around saying "Hmm...how can I be level? Let's see...." Or arguably the "will" of the "living" Force is something that's kind of beyond comprehension, and we only see the effects.

I think there can be a light and a dark side, clearly, but that one is not necessarily intrinsically good or evil. Rather, they are made up of different impulses which, depending on how they are experienced by an individual, can be good or bad. And that brings us full circle to the king of yin/yang of Eastern philosophy, rather than the good/evil of Western philosophy. You could argue that the nature of the Dark Side is such that it is very often used for evil, but that the Dark Side itself is not evil per se. Think of it this way. Is love good or evil? I would argue that depends on how it manifests. Love can be the joining of two people to work together and bring the best out of each other, without stifling the other or stifling the self, which is good.

Or love can manifest as putting your partner on a pedestal, almost in kind of a worshipful way, which denies them their own personhood and makes them almost an object of your affection, rather than a real person. This may seem "good" at first blush, because it is less obviously harmful, but it is still harmful -- to the self, and ultimately to the relationship with the other person. First, nobody is capable of sustaining themselves on a pedestal, and that kind of worship can all too easily turn to bitterness when the other person fails to live up to the fantasy of the person placing them on the pedestal. Second, that approach to love tends to deny the self, by placing the other person so far above you and in front of you, that you neglect yourself, suppress your own desires, and make yourself less than a person in service to this other person whom you claim to love. That, in turn, sacrifices both your happiness and the other person's (assuming they want you to be happy, too), and ultimately the relationship, which is not exactly "evil" but is definitely not good.

Or love can manifest as cruel possessiveness and manipulation, all in a desire to hang on to something, to possess it, again like an object instead of treating the other person like a person, which is much more obviously "evil" or at least bad. (Evil in its worst manifestations, certainly.)

So, is love evil or good? It's neither. Love is a force, and how it manifests is what determines whether it is good or evil, helpful or harmful. I see the Dark and Light Sides of the Force as simply being aspects of a force like love. Neither is inherently good or evil in the western sense, but rather what matters is how each manifests. Pure "darkness" is just as bad as pure "lightness" the same way that pure "devotional" love is just as bad as pure "possessive" love. Neither is good when manifesting in their absolute sense.
 
Most of the stuff people know about the OT have been filled in by other media so I don't think the "ancillary media" card can really be pulled in regard to the new trilogy. For so many people that state in this thread how big of a fan they are it is surprising how many shun new canon media such as books and comics.
 
Most of the stuff people know about the OT have been filled in by other media so I don't think the "ancillary media" card can really be pulled in regard to the new trilogy. For so many people that state in this thread how big of a fan they are it is surprising how many shun new canon media such as books and comics.


Ala LF / Disney and RJ ,... unless it suits them right !?
 
I totally agree with you that a lot of the failings of TLJ fall at TFA's feet. Had they taken more time to set up the world and setting it would have worked better for sure. ANH spends the first 40-45 minutes just spending time with Luke on Tatooinne so that we get a sense of who he is and what his life is like. It's why we can identify with him. Given the rushed pace of TFA we don't have proper context to the state of the galaxy after ROTJ and that was important in setting everything up so that we could understand the story better. I'm in 100% agreement with you on that.

I still don't buy Luke's failure of Ben though. I watched a video where someone argues that Luke rushing off to save his friends in Empire only puts them in more danger, which is a weak argument because in the end it is Luke who needs rescuing. Luke's flaws are his impatience and anger, but they are also tempered with experience by the end of Jedi. He proved both his teachers wrong when Vader was redeemed. He sensed good in Vader by Return of the Jedi because he even says that if there were no goodness left in him then Vader would have killed him in Empire.

All we are told in TLJ is that Luke sensed that Ben has been corrupted by Snoke and that Luke foresaw a possible dark future. If we as an audience are to believe that Vader, the most powerful evildoer in the galaxy could be redeemed, then what did Ben do that was so irredeemable? No one can answer this question. If someone has a clear answer to that, please by all means tell me. Didn't Luke already learn a lesson from Yoda in Empire that "Always in motion is the future." We don't know anything about how or why Ben was tempted by the Dark side and why would Luke turn on his own blood just because he had a vision that could very well change. Which in turn is why a lot of people wanted to know more about Snoke, if only so they could understand the dynamic of how/ why he was able to get to Ben in the first place. Was Snoke a former student of Luke? Was he somehow tied in with the Republic and knew Ben through Leia? We have no idea.

If anything it regresses Luke as a character and makes his triumphant redemption of his father meaningless if the lesson has still not been learned. It comes across to me as a cheap tactic to answer the question J.J. posed in TFA which was why is Luke secluded on that island, which in turn also points the finger of blame back at J.J. I'm reticent to try and come up with ways to try and fix the issues of these movies because they could have gone in a lot of different directions but I can see how and why these new films don't gel with the original three. I was perfectly fine with Return of the Jedi as a fitting end to the Skywalker Saga.



By and large, I agree that you can't just up and change the rules mid-game....except when you can. But if and when you do it, you need to take the time to explain why the new rules work and should be treated as new rules or a newer understanding of the rules. For example, Lucas' introduction of "midichlorians." I hated this when it was introduced, and thankfully, it was left by the wayside immediately after. But the notion of the "will of the Force" or a dichotomy between the "cosmic" and "living" Force, I think, fits. Basically, I think the Force is bigger and more complex than was described in the OT or slightly expanded upon in the PT. The Clone Wars cartoon sort of dealt with this as well, but it's kind of a confusing portion of the show, and it's not really dwelt upon. Suffice to say that I think the notion of "balance" is really essential, and that a Force out of balance may in some ways "act" to rebalance itself. But this is less than, necessarily, turning the Force into a Western, anthropomorphic deity with sentience, with consciousness and clear will, and is perhaps more like how water will seek to find its own level (at least when gravity acts upon it). In that sense, water's "will" is to be level, but it's not like water is sitting around saying "Hmm...how can I be level? Let's see...." Or arguably the "will" of the "living" Force is something that's kind of beyond comprehension, and we only see the effects.


See that at least makes some sense though the idea of balance has long been a point of contention among the fan base too.

- - - Updated - - -

Most of the stuff people know about the OT have been filled in by other media so I don't think the "ancillary media" card can really be pulled in regard to the new trilogy. For so many people that state in this thread how big of a fan they are it is surprising how many shun new canon media such as books and comics.

I'm all for ancillary material but if you need those things to understand huge elements of a movie then your script is lacking. That's where I have a problem with it. It should be there to enhance the story, not be necessary to understand the movie itself.
 
Not I. "I recognize Lucas has made a decision, but given it's a stupid-ass decision, I elected to ignore it." Weak writing with the Prequels, different weak writing with the Sequels. Take your pick.
 
It's also used as a metaphor to say to us that Star Wars is moving in a new direction and it's "killing the past" of how we perceive what SW should be. I think the killing off of our heros is also a metaphor to cement this in our consciousness. I think it's also why I'm becoming less of a fan since there moving away from what makes SW a SW movie. Future movies will have the label of SW but it won't be truly SW to me. I guess they feel like they have to go that direction to keep it fresh but at the same they are "killing it". I think they could have handled it better though without somehow giving us fans the middle finger.
To translate that even more:

No one at Disney knows how to make a good star wars movie so they have no choice but to break it apart and just do whatever the hell they want to...

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Within that context, I think the sequel trilogy works. It makes perfect sense to me why that would be a kind of narrative whiplash for a lot of viewers, and why "just ignore it" wouldn't work when it comes to suggesting that they ignore the VHS copies of the OT that they wore out before buying bootleg laserdisc rips off of ebay and DVDs and blurays and whatnot just so they could rewatch the old story over and over and over again.

Bite me with your "laserdisc rips". :p I got the damn laserdiscs before I could wear out my third set of VHS tapes (they were the widescreen collectors' edition and I didn't want to ruin them).

For me, the characters work and -- more importantly -- are interesting based on their stories. That's different from the PT where the A-to-B-to-C of it works and makes sense (e.g., Anakin falls to the dark side because he has deep-seated separation anxiety issues as a result of joining the Jedi order when he was old enough to really miss his mom -- i.e., too old), but I find it not remotely interesting compared to the reasons for Anakin's behavior that, to me, make far more sense (e.g., he turned to the Dark Side on the belief that only order-at-any-cost could end the war, end the destruction, and end the loss of life and his friends). That said, I recognize how some people's experience of TFA and especially TLJ would be more like my experience of the PT (they get it just fine, they just don't find it entertaining or the right story choice).

Me, I still disagree with the narrative choices of 1) making Anakin the central character of the PT and 2) showing his fall.

My hope...and this may be a longshot and kinda weird for folks to conceive of...is that Dave Filioni and his team end up tackling the period between ROTJ and TFA.

That's sorta what he set things up for with the finale of Rebels, and is also touched on in the Forces of Destiny stuff set during and right after ROTJ.

3/ The Rebellion became the new Republic but then just moved to a new Star System (for no good reason) and set up shop, disbanded their fleets, and took no notice whatsoever of any feasible threat from within or without their Galaxy?
They left Coruscant because that had been the seat of the Empire. The new Republic moved their governmental seat regularly... specifically to avoid having a "home world" like the Empire did. And again, YES... some did take notice of external threats... namely General Leia and the Resistance. that is literally why they existed.

A little clarification here. After Endor, the Empire still held Coruscant. When the Rebels declared themselves the New Republic, they couldn't claim it as a capitol. Nor did they want to. The first new capitol was Mon Mothma's homeworld of Chandrila, and the whole point of the rotating capitol was to prevent whatever world from becoming so steeped in corruption and political intrigue as Coruscant had over the millennia. The last we have any info on, from only a year after ROTJ, is that there was a popular uprising on Coruscant, but the ISB had the planet largely interdicted against outside forces. We don't know (yet) what's happened there.

on top of this we have the sheer level of coincidence going on in TFA?

Let's break these down...

Empire/Order turns up in huge spaceship no one noticed they were building

Star Destroyers are typical-size cruisers for the setting. The First Order built up their forces in and on the edges of the Unknown Regions. They are Unknown because no one goes there. Easy to build things in secret. That was one of only a half-dozen or so Star Destroyers the First Order has. This as opposed to the many hundreds the Empire had. If they'd turned up with a fleet of thousands, that'd warrant disbelief. This is nothin'.

pilot who is after map which ends up in droid. kid on Jakuu finds droid and meets rogue storm trooper.

Poe had followed lead to lead until he found Lor San Tekka on Jakku. Niima Outpost is the nearest large settlement to their little destroyed village, so that's where BB-8 headed. So that's also where Poe was aiming when they were shot down. So that's the settlement Finn found his way to. Palpatine had one of his Observatories there, back in the old days. I can spin speculations as to the significance of that being linked to San Tekka's people setting up there and/or Rey's strength with the Force.

But also, Star Wars is built on coincidence. The same sandcrawler just happened to pick up both Artoo and Threepio? They both just happened to be the only two droids bought by Owen Lars. And so on...

they in turn find possibly THE most famous starship in the Republic Fleet under a Tarpauline where its been sat for 20 years (oh and everything works AND the batteries not flat)

Yes, it was famous. That's why it had been stolen from Han in the first place. And why it was then stolen from those thieves. And then again. Unkar Plutt -- in whose keeping Rey had been left, before she got sick of him and struck out on her own -- had been tinkering on it as a side project for years. It hadn't been just sitting for decades.

only to take off and run into HAN SOLO ... who owns the starship (which he's managed to track from halfway across the galaxy and get to in 10 minutes)

While Han had a subroutine on constantly in hopes that the Falcon would resurface, I will semi-give you this one, as they seem to have much more drastically foreshortened hyperspace travel in the ST, and there's the problem of how it doesn't seem Rey and Finn jump to lightspeed, but Han is surprised by where the ship was -- didn't he just enter the Jakku system to pick them up?

who despite knowing the ship is (essentially bugged or trackable) takes them to Maz Kanata

I admit this is one of my quibbles. Easily resolved when I tackled my rewrite, too. *sigh*

who just happens to have LUKES LIGHTSABER in her basement

Maz' castle is established as a sort of galactic catch-all. Just abhout anyone and everyone who is off the mainstream makes it through there at one point or another. I don't have any issue with it ending up there. I look forward to maybe someday retracing that journey.

which fell into the heart of a Tababa Gas planet

Tibanna. And no it didn't.

Kid discovers she has insanely powerful force abilities.

...Literally the Hero's arc for the film.

Meanwhile the Empire have been kitting out an entire planet Killer (again no one noticed this despite it being only a few systems away)

It's Ilum -- the old source the Jedi used for their lightsaber crystals. It is also one primary source of the kiber crystals used to build the Death Stars' super lasers. Many times more would have remained unmined and inaccessible until the whole planer was worked into a hyperspace weapon. It's in the Unknown Regions, it's hard to get to, during the Republic era only the Jedi knew how to and were able to get there. The whole project likely started sometime during Palpatine's reign. Something on that scale would take over a decade, easy.

Big Problem is the re-booted the universe of Star Wars at the same time and again it did not need it so it now jars horribly with established lore.

No more a reboot than TPM was. The story is cyclical, a canon, a repeated theme built upon and evolved each time. As for jarring... Is the established lore you're referring to the post-ROTJ EU? I'm one of the one's who's honestly just as glad they wiped that to do a new take on it. Some elements of that period I like. Many I do not. Foremost, the whole tenor of that period of ancillary material. In the EU, also, things weren't "happily ever after" following Endor. Our Heroes spent the next thirty plus years going from crisis to crisis and never getting a chance to rest. And some of those stories were far worse than what we've been getting lately.

The Empire/first order is the dominant force in the universe but is staffed by (literally) utter morons and an angry kid?

It's dominant mainly by lack of opposition.

the Empire First order with a [tiny] fleet is hellbent on destroying the remnants of the Resistance BUT only has one big spaceship and is content to just rumble after them?


Fixed that for you. They have a couple other Star Destroyers out there, but they definitely don't have the resources the Empire did. The Resistance had no base to retreat to, no government the help them, and only the shirts on their backs, and the First Order could track them anywhere they went. Hux was perfectly content to let them run themselves out of gas. It's a sensible tactic, that just didn't play out as expected. Plus, Hux is a sadistic bully. It's totally in his character to want to prolong their torment.

Someone with no Jedi Training can FaceTime across the universe

Snoke did that, as stated in the film.

and move mountains?

A smallish pile of rocks isn't a mountain.

Force ghosts can now come and go at will

Always did.

and have physical presence and abilities

Have since ROTJ.

the big Bad is Hugh Hefner in a silk Kimono but we couldn't think of a back story so he's dead in favour of moron and angry kid

Snoke got nearly as much screen time and development as the Emperor in the OT. The Empire in Star Wars implied an Emperor. The question was: figurehead or evil mastermind. Empire and Jedi established he was the latter. No backstory. No first name. Nothing. It took the PT and ancillary materials to fill in his backstory. We don't know yet if Snoke's backstory will be relevant in future films, or just explored in the ancillary materials.

the list goes on ...

Oh, I know. I've seen it. Repeatedly. *heh*

universal tone and feel between the movies

Which is odd, because one thing that has remained consistent for me and many others over the last almost-20 years has been the utterly different tone of the PT compared to the OT.

the Last Jedi was utterly cringe-worthy and just did not to me feel at all like a Star Wars movie .. it was in places parody, in others sheer pantomime! .. mostly just a jumbled chaotic and (literally) incomprehensible mess of ideas.

Issues I have with story choices, pacing, editing, and lenses aside, it felt like a Star Wars movie to me (not the best Star Wars movie, but a Star Wars movie), and I had no problem comprehending it, so its incomprehensibility is entirely subjective. *shrug*

I like to believe that Carries untimely passing was partly to blame as i think they had a plan for her but her passing meant rejigging a lot of stuff to try and make it fit.

If that were the case, they would have rejigged it to remove her from the story by the end of the film. The fact that Leia's still alive in the released film is a pretty good indicator Carrie's death had no impact on the story.

I think there can be a light and a dark side, clearly, but that one is not necessarily intrinsically good or evil. Rather, they are made up of different impulses which, depending on how they are experienced by an individual, can be good or bad. And that brings us full circle to the king of yin/yang of Eastern philosophy, rather than the good/evil of Western philosophy. You could argue that the nature of the Dark Side is such that it is very often used for evil, but that the Dark Side itselfis not evil per se.

I'm-a toss this your way. I've spent enough time navel-gazing about these things over the years. Stripping away subjective valuations until I was left with objective concepts. In the beginning the universe began. Ever since, entropy has been increasing. This is neither good nor bad, it simply is. Creation itself is an anentropic expression. Of the universe, or of anything smaller within it. Every painting or sculpture or song or building or child is an echo of the Big Bang. An outburst of creative energy in defiance of entropy. All one can do is work to retard entropy or accelerate it, on whatever scale one can effect. Sometimes creation can seem destructive, sometimes preservation can be destructive. Tearing down an old building to replace it with a newer, better one, for instance. That's how I've defined the Force and its Dark Side. See what you can do with that. :)

--Jonah
 
Im gonna be brutal here ... i understand all this filled in detail and its fine, as i'm sure you (not literally you) can retro write and back-splain as much as you want however i can sit down and watch episodes 1 to 6 and more specifically 4 - 6, and narratively its a linear story that other than the odd contradiction flows well together (caveat - whether you like those stories or not in regard to the Prequels) I know the expanded universe and books filled in a lot of surrounding details post the OT but the story arc was more or less logical (as far as the SW Universe) and the characters in them more or less consistent.

Thats not the case with the New Trilogy .. if you are trying to tell me that to enjoy these movies i need to know the entire back story as filled in by the books, comics and Producer etc in order for them to make any kind of sense or that im just not getting them, then i heartily disagree with that viewpoint ...
I've had zero wants or expectations going into these (just in case anyone flings the '...its because it didnt live up to your fan theories' card, however i did expect them to more or less make sense and be well written.

the whole narrative basis of the New trilogy is just nonsensical and the socio political background seems very at odds with the universe we knew upto Jedi .(30 years on or not).. its a 50/50 mash up of they've moved on but they haven't and Block buster Set pieces. where virtually every ounce of common sense or logic has be excised.

As to the coincidences in TFA i know perfectly well all the back details of why and what but they are just laughably unbelievable and clearly shoved in just to make the films quick and pacy ... Also chucking throwaway lines into side movies such as Rogue one in order to make something at odds with the OT in TFA's isn't cleaver .. its showing that there are problems.

I've read a couple of the books pre TFA etc but they books are as badly written and plotted as these movies ..

You can fill in the gaps with as much back detail as you want, be they technical, narrative or otherwise but they don't excuse the basic facts that these new movies are messy and ill thought through which can just about be forgiven but not quite for TFA's but in the case of TLJ are frankly inexcusable ...

i guess its a Marmite subject ... you either love them, hate em or are meh and don't care either way. My opinions like many others isn't likely to change as i can only go on my personal feelings and the effect they had on me. I still love Star Wars i just know which parts i love a lot more than others.

As Obiwan might say .. they're 'probably' all great ... From a certain point of view

May the Force be with you all ... always!
 
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