I’ve seen The Last Jedi three times, and I think it’s possible that Larry is up for seeing it once again. I ended up seeing it the third time on my own while Larry was at work during the Christmas/New Years week, and regardless I’m up for a fourth time. You see, I loved the movie. I do like to write, but I know I’m not very good at critical analysis writing, and instead, I’d like to provide some great writing that gets at what I did like about the movie:
I’ve shared this just a few posts ago, but I love Jenny Nicholson’s take on the backlash of the movie:
https://www.tor.com/2018/01/04/luke-skywalker-isnt-supposed-to-be-nice/
Here’s a Twitter feed that I thought was particularly apt in its discussion of how Luke was never going to be the “idealistic farmboy” from the original trilogy – you may need to click on the date/time link within to see the entire Twitter thread:
https://twitter.com/swankmotron/status/950394363384807424
The article here discusses things that could be “problems” about the movie but really aren’t all that much:
https://tay.kinja.com/four-problems-with-the-last-jedi-from-someone-who-thou-1821630144
For me, I had some quibbles with certain scenes, but certainly not enough to make me hate the movie and declare Star Wars over:
- Leia Poppins: it’s a slightly jarring scene, but in that universe, I’m not at all of the mind that it’s impossible; after all, she IS the twin sister of the most powerful Jedi still alive and the daughter of possibly the most powerful Force user in history.
- Holdo not telling Poe the plan: As someone who was in the military, yeah, leadership does not always tell the plan to everyone. ESPECIALLY if that one individual, as hot as he may be and my man Oscar Isaac is certainly hawwwt, just went and played hero, got the entire bomb squadron eliminated, and recently demoted.
- The whole Luke thing: I completely disagree with those who say Luke wouldn’t act the way he did in The Last Jedi. And the articles above articulate it way better than me.
I loved the movie and loved that it basically wrapped up a lot of the “mystery boxes” from The Force Awakens. Episode IX has the freedom to do something exciting and new, and doesn’t have to be a Return of the Jedi of this trilogy, and that’s amazing. Who knows where it’s going to go next? I love that unknown.