Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker |OT| Revenge of a Sith (SPOILERS NOW OPEN)

[Veelk]

So I was watching Jenny Nicholson and she made a good point. They play up her taking up the Skywalker name. But her only real connection to it was Luke. Leia never identified as a Skywalker and she has as much connection to Han Solo and Ben Solo as she does Luke anyway - in fact, probably much more.

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Just Write had his own video on this that I haven't seen linked here.



He's kinder or atleast more understanding than most others, but he brings up a similar point at this timestamp. She knew Han for like less than a day and all he ever told her was to get off her ass because the universe is bigger than some desert hole. Luke she knew for a few days, but he similarly mostly told her the Jedi were shit and she should give up on her dreams until she convinced him otherwise. But Leia, she trained her for a year. Leia is the one who actually taught her techniques, maybe told her some more affirming philosophies, etc. It all happened offscreen, but of the main 3, Organa was the one who was there for her the most. Also, tho, Leia's naming convention is a bit weird. Organa is her adopted parents name, Skywalker is why she is a Jedi and Solo was the name she took after her husband (which I know they divorced and he's dead, but....I would imagine she'd maybe want to reclaim it in remembrance. Maybe Organa-Solo).

 

[UltraMagnus]

The other thing with the last scene is they could have set that up somewhat like in the conversation she has with Luke could have gone like

Rey: I'm alone, I have no family.

Luke: Family is what you make of it Rey. You just need to know where the look.

Something like that then is a clear setup with a payoff.

 

[Deleted member 19218]

That's it though isn't it?

The Last Jedi was the 8th episode of 9. It shouldn't have been leaving a clean slate. It should have left people absolutely dying to see the final entry of the Skywalker Saga with several plot lines ending on cliff hangers and with the audience absolutely desperate to find out what will happen next.

Imagine Infinity War finished in a similar way and then they had to write a story from scratch for Endgame. Do you think Endgame would have been anywhere near as anticipated? Of course it wouldn't. The excitement for Endgame came from the plot momentum from Infinity War. The Last Jedi finished with next to no plot momentum going into the final entry in the series and that ultimately helped to kill the potential of TRoS.

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TLJ was fantastic for setting up a great finale though because it was doing away with Star Wars cliches.

It all comes to that throne room scene, Rey makes her attempt to bring Kylo back and he says no. There's some finality to it, like he's committed and there isn't going to be some Darth Vader style redemption. Kylo kills Snoke and Luke sacrifices himself, essentially doing away with the whole Jedi vs Sith conflict and removing that for the first time in all three trilogies. Rey gives up on searching for her parents also which leaves her free to focus on her future.

So what we have is:

• Rey who has come to accept her past and can now move on with a clear mind
• Kylo who has determination becomes the supreme leader
• The Sith/Jedi are eradicated from the storyline

It's like Kill Bill 2 or something, this is just going to be some final showdown of ultimate destiny but instead JJ brings back the jedi, the sith, Palpatine returns and Kylo is redeemed. That's just a cop out. That was great to see with Vader but seeing it again? It just didn't feel original, it didn't feel like anyone had the confidence to create a new villain and remain committed to that character being a villain.

It should have simply been Rey kills Kylo, the rebels defeat the First Order. Beauty in the simplicity. JJ had a chance to do something different but instead went backwards and inserted those cliches after Rian removed them.

 

[Halbrand]

It should have simply been Rey kills Kylo

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That would have been awful and was never in the cards

Ben was headed for redemption the whole time.

 

[legend166]

I wish they'd done like a five year time skip and the whole film was set amongst the background of a general uprising on multiple planets due to the story of Luke spreading through the galaxy, like was shown at the end of TLJ. If they were desperate to bring back Palpatine, have it be done by Kylo after he disappeared for years trying to find out how to manipulate the dark side to revive him or something.

 

[Deleted member 19218]

That would have been awful and was never in the cards

Ben was headed for redemption the whole time.

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But in the end, his redemption was still awful and unoriginal and showed a lack of confidence in creating a great villain and staying committed to that.

I heard about sith redemption talk in Episodes V, VI, VII, VIII and IX. It's boring, it's so dull. However, at least Episode VIII tried to break this tradition when Rey confronts Kylo and he refuses.

 

[Veelk]

Sifo-Dyas makes perfect sense within AotC, it doesn't even need an explanation beyond what we have. There was a Jedi Master named Sifo-Dyas who was killed 10 years ago. A clone army was ordered under his name 10 years ago. The guy who hired the template for the army 10 years ago was named Tyranus. Tyranus is Dooku, who was formerly a Jedi. The Jedi Archives' contents on Kamino were removed by a Jedi. Just put 2 and 2 together. Dooku killed Sifo-Dyas and used his name to place the order, then deleted Kamino from the archives and ditched the Order.

It only gets weirdly complicated when you bring TCW into it and find out that Sifo-Dyas actually did order the army.

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The last time I watched AotC, I have done so knowing Sifu Dyas actually did order it from reading the wookiepedia, so that probably affected my understanding of it, but I don't remember thinking it was Dooku that did it. It was more like "Well, palpatine probably has a lot of various Jedi under his thumb in one way or another" and that's who deleted the archive footage. Maybe even did a mind trick on one of the weaker Jedi or something. I don't even remember if the film itself was ever implied that Dooku was the one to actually do it. Even the Dooku reveal just seemed more like it was a call back to Vader's fall from grace archtype. "Oh no, this paragon has become evil, how could this be?", you know? Like, sure, all the pieces are there for that interpretation, but it's not like we have a "Dooku is behind it all!" scene, and would you say Lucas would have been so subtle as to lay out these clues and just assume that the audience would connected who did what? I doubt it.

Regardless, even if pieces are there for us to indicate Dooku as the real culprit, I'm not talking about the reveal itself really. I'm talking about the fact that there was a corperation (or whatever it was) that, when asked to commission a clone army, was like "Yeah, okay, whatever, just have your credit card ready" to which Dooku just offered it to them and the Jedi Order somehow didn't notice that the Kaminoan's were drawing on the staggeringly massive funds, all while Kamino is erased from the Jedi Archives, yet somehow is all kept a secret despite that the Kaminoans all weren't given a reason to keep the clone army a secret and assumed that the Jedi who visited them (obiwan) was fully aware of what they were doing and talked to him like it was the most causal thing ever. "Like, yeah bro, your clones are coming along all fine, let us give you the tour", all despite never somehow reaching out to the Jedi order to actually confirm that the clones are a thing they want.

 

[Deleted member 21339]

Yeah, it's great. That's exactly who Anakin should have been. Emotionally and socially stunted because he's been stuck in an order of zen hypocrites for 10 years.

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I think you're prob giving George too much credit. I refuse to believe that was the intent behind the writing.

 

[MisterHero]

I remember asking why Rey didn't just get a DNA test when she reached a civilized world. Even without a giant database the Resistance in isolation would detect a Palpatine. :p

 

[matrix-cat]

I find it so depressing to think about what this movie does for Rey's character arc and overall journey. Remember Rey? Brunette, English accent? The main character of this trilogy and not some other movies from 40 years ago? There was a time when she was her own person with her own struggles. There was a nice opportunity here to reflect on where she came from and how much she's grown over these movies, but instead all those moments are either devoted to Luke or just general OT nostalgia and fanservice.

We have Rey's nobody arc retconned so she can get a Luke-style shocking parent reveal and fight Luke's villain instead. We watch Rey having a crisis of conscience and not going back to her trendy little converted AT-AT house on Jakku where she lived her whole life, but back to Luke's house on Ahch-To where she spent a couple of nights. We end the movie not on Rey thinking about how far she's come since that girl who marked off the days until her parents came back, but by visiting Luke's other house on Tatooine. And, of course, we don't end on "I'm just Rey". We don't even end on Rey making peace with her own real name. Nope, she's gotta be Rey Skywalker, because if you ain't part of the OT squad you ain't shit.

It just feels like JJ had no confidence in his own character to stand alongside other Star Wars greats and just had her be girl Luke. I don't know how many people saw Jenny Nicholson's video about that insane Alan Dean Foster treatment for Episode IX, but it ended with Rey just standing by watching while a revived Luke fought a bunch of Snoke clones with amazing turbo-whirling Jedi powers, and I kind of feel like JJ would have done something similar if he'd been able to make this whole trilogy :P

 

[VorpalNonsense]

TROS:
Ochi is a "Jedi hunter"/Sith loyalist who Sheev, who must have been alive since at least 15 ABY or so, sent out to capture his granddaughter. He found Rey's parents on Jakku but they sold (!!) their daughter to Unkar Plutt to protect her, then he captured them and took off in his ship (even though Rey was standing RIGHT THERE YELLING AT THE SHIP TO COME BACK). When he couldn't get the parents to speak about Rey's whereabouts, he killed them with his ceremonial dagger, which he had specifically carved to visually demonstrate the location of Sheev's Wayfinder within the wreckage of the Death Star if you hold the dagger up at a certain angle and stand on a certain spot of land. For some reason. He also inscribed on the dagger in the Sith runes the coordinates to find the DSII pieces. He then went to Pasaana, for some reason, and Luke and Lando were chasing him presumably because he's a Jedi hunter and he knew the way to Exegol, which they wanted to find for reasons, but he died when he stepped into quicksand outside his parked ship and got eaten by a snake.

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Dont forget that her parents throw Ochi off Rey's trail by simply yelling "She's not on Jakku!" and it works.

If there was one thing I could change/remove in this movie it'd be that damned dagger. Just deleting it entirely and moving its purpose to D-0.

 

[MisterHero]

The problem with Rey from Day 1 was that these movies were always about the Skywalkers. It's not because of blood, but because Luke and later Anakin were the POV characters.

In 1977 people watched the original and accepted Luke as the main character. They then took what people liked from SW77, left what wasn't liked behind, and expanded them into the sequels. Luke being the POV is built into ESB and RotJ.

Then the prequels came around. Anakin was the POV character which was necessary to "rationalize" his heel turn. Even then, the prequels did an adequate job splitting POV duties between Anakin, Obi-Wan, Sheev and the Jedi Council.

Two trilogies, six+ movies and copious media later... it's pretty well established that the Skywalkers are the Star Wars POV characters.

Now that they're all dead, I predict the future POV character will be recieved well enough.

Rey Nobody was never going to happen though.

 

[vatstep]

 

[Sweeney Swift]

Another great article I think deserves some love, even though it has a lot of non-SW examples: https://birthmoviesdeath.com/2019/12/30/pandering-to-fans-never-produced-anything-great I agree completely with all of it btw (unfortunately even the "Alien Covenant was a risk" part)

Frankly, you know what else wouldn't look like it does, had fans been pandered to? The Empire Strikes Back. To many people, the original Star Wars trilogy (and all films of that era) have simply always existed; they're enshrined forever as immutable canon. But those films were new once, and they weren't universally well-received. Empire was a huge departure from the serial-adventure formula of Star Wars, shrinking its scope, splitting up its main characters, telling the audience the villain was the hero's dad, and introducing a Muppet - voiced by Frank Oz, no less! - in place of Oscar-nominated Alec Guinness. Many moviegoers were irate. Sound familiar?

Return of the Jedi was no different, with its bizarre first act and teddy-bear-filled second. BBS records still exist wherein fans complain about Leia being Luke's sister, or about the Emperor's lightning powers. The franchise is practically defined by left-field turns, and it's only through the passage of time that we've accepted them as, simply, Star Wars. Even the prequel trilogy's strengths are seeing greater appreciation today, alongside continued criticism of its weaknesses.

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When Halloween III: Season of the Witch came out, fans were outraged that a Halloween film would dare drop Michael Myers; it flopped, and the series quickly returned to the Myers saga. Decades later, though, Halloween III has been widely reappraised as one of the stronger Halloweens, while the subsequent Myers films meet ever-decreasing critical returns. You see this pattern everywhere: given enough time, risk-taking becomes appreciated more and more.

Time will be kind to The Last Jedi. The Rise of Skywalker may benefit from distance, too, when we look back on the saga as a whole. What's undeniable, though, is that Rise was created "for the fans" first. It made many fans happy in the process, but its shotgun blast of delightful moments doesn't feel as singular or whole as the series' best films. When trying to fit in as many "moments" as possible, you lose track of the bigger picture: theme, character, story, and so on. But at least you get lots of little applause breaks.

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[sphagnum]

I think you're prob giving George too much credit. I refuse to believe that was the intent behind the writing.

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Why? It's literally what happens on screen, and we know George didn't want Hayden to act likeable. He specifically directed him to be annoying and whiney!

The entire point of the Jedi in the prequels is that they're already fallen and they failed Anakin. Qui-Gon maybe could have taught him well enough, but not the rest. The Order is explicitly inhumane ("Mourn them do not, miss them do not.") and explicitly bans people from romantic love. Anakin went through puberty with a bunch of emotional robots who just kept telling him to repress himself. The outcome is completely consistent with what Hayden portrays.

 

[The Unsent]

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"Somehow Hitler has returned" I don't know why I laughed at thought that way at the cinema. These are the next generation and they may have done course work on Palpatine, lol.

 

[Veelk]

The entire point of the Jedi in the prequels is that they're already fallen and they failed Anakin.

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Honestly, I don't think it is. It was an idea within the prequels, yes, but all it really amounted to was Quigon being a bit of a renegade in choosing to train Anakin. All Quigon's "outside the norm" really amounted to was some philosophical differences that didn't really manifest in him acting differently from a usual Jedi. And the Jedi Order ends up being right! His attachment to Padme is framed as being the cause of his turn to the dark side. Lucas even says in an interview something to the effect of "They fell in love, and now have to bear the full consequences of that."

And no voices of authority ever emphasize this really. Obiwan is the 'good' Jedi protagonist of the trilogy, but he never sees Anakin's fall as the result of the Jedi order failing him. He says that he failed him, personally, but he never renounces the Order. Yoda doesn't consider the order to blame for it. Yoda blames the dark side for seducing him and sees Anakin as just not good enough of a Jedi to resist giving a shit about his loved ones dying. If he was a real Jedi, he'd just not care because they'd be one with the force, so it's all okay. No one outside the Jedi order really criticizes the order either, except for Palpatine.

I feel like this "The Jedi Order was corrupt" idea is just something that fans kinda latched onto when they saw that one character (Quigon) was kinda, sorta of a renegade, in a philosophical sense, and then they saw that the way the Jedi Order treats Anakin is horrible from the audiences perspective, and just recognized that the idea that the Jedi Order has stagnated and created Vader through their cultish, crazy ways.

But I don't think any of that was any more Lucas' intention than it was Lucas' intention to depict the Padme and Anakin's romance as wierd or creepy. And I don't just mean that from Anakin's side where he's a creepy stalker who doesn't seem emotionally stable and is free with murdering, but also Padme with how she pushes him away because 'she's a senator' while constantly pulling him into romantic getaway scenes where they frolic and have candle lit dinners and shit, which let me remind you culminates in a marriage where, by all indications, she seems happy until Anakin starts having bad dreams. It's obvious that he's depicting a Romeo & Juliet style romance where these two kids are passionate about each other and it's their social standing that causes problems, not that they both have problematic intentions with each other, which is why it all culminates in a big wedding with a happy marriage life afterwards for them. He meant to show true love, he just couldn't write it.

Same thing with Jedi order. He meant to show a noble order of knights, whose mysticism and strange philosophies make them mysterious and cool, fighting for righteous causes until the tragedy of a dark villain betrays them, not a creepy cult of inhuman zen monks that don't allow for humanity.

 

[The Silver]

The fact the Kylo was always going to be redeemed from the start cause you know, we have to repeat the OT, meant that there was little chance of a smart follow up to something like TLJ. It's far easier to sell his redemption by introducing a bigger threat, make Kylo come off looking was he used all his life and how it all wasn't "really" his fault.(look at the how comics are currently whitewashing him) Having him triple down as the sole bad guy requires a much defter writing hand to make it work and that certainly isn't JJ.

You could make it a big character study about Kylo but does anyone really think the overlords would have signed off for the last movie of the trilogy, the one that they stupidly told themselves had to tie in all 9 movies, to be that kind of more subdued, slower paced movie? Fuck no it had to be big and bombastic and louder than everything that came before it.

Palpatine was the master key to do everything. Redeem Kylo, make it more epic in scope than anything before, hit all your nostalgia points, and tie in all 9 movies.

 

[Chitown B]

I loved it. Saw it night before opening. And of course 90% of this thread are going to hate it. And I don't care.

 

[matrix-cat]

Rey Nobody was never going to happen though.

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It DID happen! It happened, and we all lived in that world for two wonderful years until JJ retconned it because he's a hack :P

I mean, there is so much Star Wars media out there where the Skywalkers are not involved at all or only play bit parts. You don't need a Skywalker main character to write Star Wars, you never have, and Rey in Episodes 7 and 8 was an excellent example of that. TFA Rey grew to adulthood with no Skywalker baggage whatsoever, and TLJ Rey is 100% explicitly not a Skywalker either by blood or by symbolic bond. Rey Skywalker as a concept is invented whole cloth for this final movie in what feels like a weak, reactionary apology for daring to make a Star Wars movie that upset Reddit.

It's this wrongheaded notion that Episode 9 had to tie together and be a grand ending for the Skywalker saga that ends up sinking everything. The Skywalker saga was done with Return of the Jedi. Episodes 7 and 8 aren't extensions of the story of 6; they're an entirely new story that happens to feature some returning characters. Luke got a wonderful new character arc in TLJ but it's just that, a new arc, and not some hanging plot thread that absolutely had to be followed up on after ROTJ. In order to 'end' the Skywalker saga Episode 9 ironically has to un-end it by resurrecting Sheev, and then end it by just killing him again. Sheev was dead in ROTJ. Shit was done. We were on to a new story. We had all these new characters and themes. Episode 9 only had to be the end to 7 and 8, not the entire thing.

Ugh, I can't get over it. I have to stop doing this to myself. Quoting my own first post in this thread from before I'd seen TROS:

Can't wait to fucking ruin my goddamn life coming back to this thread every day for the next few months.

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Maybe I'm a Jedi cursed by prophetic visions :P

 

[lmcfigs]

I loved it. Saw it night before opening. And of course 90% of this thread are going to hate it. And I don't care.

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I don't really get this attitude. I loved TFA. It's not my fault it's sequels were trash.

 

[studyguy]

Just finished watching it today, expected it to be worse. It was just fine I guess? Didn't think it was that bad but idk, internet made me expect much worse.

 

[Ziltoidia 9]

In a story telling front the movie was bad to me, but about halfway threw when things started to have more weight on screen it started to feel better.

Thing about Sheev is, he is so camp that it makes it work. I would have had the ending sequence have more aspects to it, and have less jumping around in the first part. They didnt mind having exposition dialog in those sequence, so they could have just condensed it down and have the movie start further along in the story.

I feel that they wanted to finally have a Rey, Finn, Poe team up mission, but maybe they could have done a different sequence. To me the actually story started when Kerri Russel's character came into play.

 

[HotHamBoy]

In a story telling front the movie was bad to me, but about halfway threw when things started to have more weight on screen it started to feel better.

Thing about Sheev is, he is so camp that it makes it work. I would have had the ending sequence have more aspects to it, and have less jumping around in the first part. They didnt mind having exposition dialog in those sequence, so they could have just condensed it down and have the movie start further along in the story.

I feel that they wanted to finally have a Rey, Finn, Poe team up mission, but maybe they could have done a different sequence. To me the actually story started when Kerri Russel's character came into play.

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I found the movie very entertaining even though I thought it was absolute dreck, several levels below the previous two films. It's very dumb in a good way if you've already accepted the death of Star Wars. Manic, hyper-cornball, eye-melting circus tent shit.

It's the Crank 2 of Star Wars films.

 

[Deleted member 32822]

Sheev is so camp, he's basically an intergalactic drag queen. I never get tired of seeing him.

 

[HotHamBoy]

Just finished watching it today, expected it to be worse. It was just fine I guess? Didn't think it was that bad but idk, internet made me expect much worse.

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from a writing and filmmaking theory perspective the movie is dropping the ball constantly IMO

like, when i judge the film I'm not thinking of it from the "what would i like to see as a Star Wars fan" perspective, but rather from a "what are the logical narrative paths, which inherent ideas would be the most satisfying to explore and payoff, what are the character arcs saying about the characters, what is the message being expressed by these choices, etc" point of view.

And also dialogue. Hoo boy. And editing. Yowza.

 

[Yukari]

Does Lucas watch the movie yet? wonder how he feels about it.

 

[HotHamBoy]

Does Lucas watch the movie yet? wonder how he feels about it.

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[Naijaboy]

Just Write had his own video on this that I haven't seen linked here.



He's kinder or atleast more understanding than most others, but he brings up a similar point at this timestamp. She knew Han for like less than a day and all he ever told her was to get off her ass because the universe is bigger than some desert hole. Luke she knew for a few days, but he similarly mostly told her the Jedi were shit and she should give up on her dreams until she convinced him otherwise. But Leia, she trained her for a year. Leia is the one who actually taught her techniques, maybe told her some more affirming philosophies, etc. It all happened offscreen, but of the main 3, Organa was the one who was there for her the most. Also, tho, Leia's naming convention is a bit weird. Organa is her adopted parents name, Skywalker is why she is a Jedi and Solo was the name she took after her husband (which I know they divorced and he's dead, but....I would imagine she'd maybe want to reclaim it in remembrance. Maybe Organa-Solo).

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For his theory on what to do with Rose:

I have no idea why they didn't think of that. Though I do disagree about Ben being unredeemable. It was just rushed in this film. In the meantime...

 

[Megatron]

I find it so depressing to think about what this movie does for Rey's character arc and overall journey. Remember Rey? Brunette, English accent? The main character of this trilogy and not some other movies from 40 years ago? There was a time when she was her own person with her own struggles. There was a nice opportunity here to reflect on where she came from and how much she's grown over these movies, but instead all those moments are either devoted to Luke or just general OT nostalgia and fanservice.

We have Rey's nobody arc retconned so she can get a Luke-style shocking parent reveal and fight Luke's villain instead. We watch Rey having a crisis of conscience and not going back to her trendy little converted AT-AT house on Jakku where she lived her whole life, but back to Luke's house on Ahch-To where she spent a couple of nights. We end the movie not on Rey thinking about how far she's come since that girl who marked off the days until her parents came back, but by visiting Luke's other house on Tatooine. And, of course, we don't end on "I'm just Rey". We don't even end on Rey making peace with her own real name. Nope, she's gotta be Rey Skywalker, because if you ain't part of the OT squad you ain't shit.

It just feels like JJ had no confidence in his own character to stand alongside other Star Wars greats and just had her be girl Luke. I don't know how many people saw Jenny Nicholson's video about that insane Alan Dean Foster treatment for Episode IX, but it ended with Rey just standing by watching while a revived Luke fought a bunch of Snoke clones with amazing turbo-whirling Jedi powers, and I kind of feel like JJ would have done something similar if he'd been able to make this whole trilogy :P

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The nobody arc WAS the retcon, as that clearly not what Abrams set up in TFA. RoS undoes the retcon.

Palpatine wasn't Luke's villain he was the villain of the whole series. He was the villain in Episodes 1-6 And then again in 9. I think it was done to connect the stories.

As for Rey's character/personality, she didn't seem to have much of one to me, this episode developed her more than the other two combined In my eyes.

 

[Officer Big Mac]

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That's how I felt. Shit just happens because why not?

 

[Deleted member 31817]

The nobody arc WAS the retcon, as that clearly not what Abrams set up in TFA. RoS undoes the retcon.

Palpatine wasn't Luke's villain he was the villain of the whole series. He was the villain in Episodes 1-6 And then again in 9. I think it was done to connect the stories.

As for Rey's character/personality, she didn't seem to have much of one to me, this episode developed her more than the other two combined In my eyes.

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JJ didn't have anything specific in mind because of his mystery box hackery lol. Saying the clarification of her identity is a retcon just because you didn't like it is absurd.

And no he was only the villain of the sequel trilogy in the very last movie and marketing ran with it. The fact that people buy into it is amazing considering he isn't even hinted at in TFA or TLJ.

 

[electroshockwave]

The nobody arc WAS the retcon, as that clearly not what Abrams set up in TFA. RoS undoes the retcon

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And what exactly did JJ "set up" in TFA? It was just another mystery box. Rey's parents being nobody is literally not a retcon. Rey's parents choosing to be nobody and selling her for drinking money because they love her (?) very much is.

 

[Megatron]

Of course he had it in mind, if he didn't why would he have retconned it?

And honestly I don't care either way who her parents were. I had a lot of issues with TLJ, but that wasn't one of them.

 

[jack_package_200]

Another great article I think deserves some love, even though it has a lot of non-SW examples: https://birthmoviesdeath.com/2019/12/30/pandering-to-fans-never-produced-anything-great I agree completely with all of it btw (unfortunately even the "Alien Covenant was a risk" part)

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I need to rewatch Prometheus and Alien: Covenant

 

[Megatron]

And what exactly did JJ "set up" in TFA? It was just another mystery box. Rey's parents being nobody is literally not a retcon. Rey's parents choosing to be nobody and selling her for drinking money because they love her (?) very much is.

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he was setting it up as a mystery deliberately. If the answer to the mystery he set up was 'oh they were nobody' why would he have bothered setting that up, and why would he have changed it In RoS?

 

[Deleted member 31817]

Of course he had it in mind, if he didn't why would he have retconned it?

And honestly I don't care either way who her parents were. I had a lot of issues with TLJ, but that wasn't one of them.

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Because he's boring and the tier 3 fan reaction to Rey being a nobody was people complaining about her power level

 

[Deleted member 31817]

And what exactly did JJ "set up" in TFA? It was just another mystery box. Rey's parents being nobody is literally not a retcon. Rey's parents choosing to be nobody and selling her for drinking money because they love her (?) very much is.

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JJ getting all the credit for setting up things he didn't actually say or do because he leaves everything intentionally vague because he's not a good original storyteller is pretty annoying.

 

[electroshockwave]

Of course he had it in mind, if he didn't why would he have retconned it?

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Because he's a hack. Bringing Palpatine back and making Rey his granddaughter is practically an admission of creative bankruptcy. If it was the plan from the outset why would Johnson have been allowed to deviate from it?

Don't believe the last minute return of Palpatine is some planned out thing either, just because they've retroactively marketed the trilogy as the end of the Skywalker saga.

 

[caliph95]

Also i don't know how much JJ sets up Rey parents to be important other than using mystery box to let other writers figure it out considering you have Maz literally telling Rey her parents don't matter and to stop worrying about it

It feels like it left it open for the writers

Maz Kanata : Dear child. I see your eyes. You already know the truth. Whomever you're waiting for on Jakku... they're never coming back... But... there's someone who still could.

 

[Fj0823]

The nobody arc WAS the retcon, as that clearly not what Abrams set up in TFA. RoS undoes the retcon.

Palpatine wasn't Luke's villain he was the villain of the whole series. He was the villain in Episodes 1-6 And then again in 9. I think it was done to connect the stories.

As for Rey's character/personality, she didn't seem to have much of one to me, this episode developed her more than the other two combined In my eyes.

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A retcon is a new piece of information that contradicts or changes the interpretation of what's already been established.

Abrams established jackshit in TFA, so Rian did not retcon TFA in anyway, in fact he paid off those mysteries.

 

[matrix-cat]

The only thing The Force Awakens sets up about Rey's parents is that... she had some. And they left her on Jakku for some reason. And Maz says "They're never coming back". That's it. That's all there is. JJ might have had some idea about where he wanted it to go, sure, but he didn't include it in the text itself. You can't retcon something that only exists in another creator's imagination :P

 

[The Unsent]

I think the Palpatine reveal was the retcon, not "filfhy junk traders" because the mirror scene, and nobody 'twist' was saying that's all she was and the force awakened her, 'there has been an awakening have you felt it' and that's why she was so powerful.

Now Obi Wan was calling out for Rey's voice in TFA, which might mean they was a connection in 2015, but it could just be a force ghost reaching out, as part of the awakening, not a thrust of the story like Rey having to accept she's nobody in TLJ. If Rey's parents were meant to an important blood line, that scene wouldn't be treated like the climax of the TLJ and arguably the most emotion scene. Kylo simply lying or misleading her wouldn't be a good climax in the grand story. Saying '... but we don't know the whole story' is bollocks, to be honest, lol. That wasn't the point.

 

[FFNB]

The trilogy itself not being about the clone wars is one of the single biggest opportunities in cinema history imo.


You're simultaneously defending the Rey parentage reveal as not an extreme example of poor writing and missing the point of the last film's messages while misremembering the fine details because of how little information is actually provided during what is at the end of the day very long winded exposition.... 👀

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I don't remember which kid was Palpatine's offspring because it's been a while since I've seen the movie. That doesn't change the fact that getting hung up over Palpatine boning and having kids is incredibly stupid and pedantic.

We were told all we needed to know about Rey's parents for the purposes of her growth and characterization: they were junk traders. From Rey's POV, that's literally all she was aware of her whole life. When Ben probed her mind in TFA and TLJ, he could only know what Rey, herself knows. So he tells her they were junk traders. The drinking money part is most certainly Ben being the abusive prick he is and targeting Rey's weakness and fear of being unwanted/abandoned. Ben doesn't know she's a Palpatine, because Rey doesn't know she's a Palpatine.

Then we find out in TRoS that her junk trader parents were also the offspring of Palpatine, and that she wasn't abandoned out of hate or because her parents didn't love or want her.

Did we really need some long, drawn out explanation beyond that? Do we really need to know more about Rey's parents in order to understand Rey's conflict, which was thoroughly explored in TLJ already? Did we need the backstory of Owen and Beru to understand why Luke was ok with leaving for Alderaan with Obi-Wan? The movies give us more than enough to work with to understand the context of the situation our protagonists are in, and why they are in the mental states they are in during those moments of the film.

It's not even remotely an example of "extremely poor writing." I genuinely want to know what more should have been said about her parents. For me, it all seemed pretty clear, straightforward, and easy to connect the dots.

 

[Nephrahim]

A retcon is a new piece of information that contradicts or changes the interpretation of what's already been established.

Abrams established jackshit in TFA, so Rian did not retcon TFA in anyway, in fact he paid off those mysteries.

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This. Who cares if the idea that she was a palpatine was a twinkle in JJ's mind when he made TFA, without anything on film, it's entirely speculation. TLJ can't retcon somthing that only existed in his head.

 

[BizzyBum]

Thinking about it I think the funniest thing in the film was the ancient Sith dagger with its hidden tape measure perfectly lining up with a crashed Death Star.

 

[The Unsent]

This. Who cares if the idea that she was a palpatine was a twinkle in JJ's mind when he made TFA, without anything on film, it's entirely speculation. TLJ can't retcon somthing that only existed in his head.

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Honestly Rey would have specifically seen Empress Palpatine/Darth Rey in the cave on Ahch-to, but is indeed a retcon. But I don't think that's the biggest criticism, it's because it's a cliche and we've seen dark lineage before in SW and it's boring.

 

[Ottaro]

Also I guess Benicio del Toro just wasn't important enough? What a waste of time that whole sequence was in the Last Jedi

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His entire function in TLJ was to provide Finn with the moral counterargument against Rose.
Rose is trying to convince Finn to care. Del Toro tells him not to care because both sides are dirty and you should look out for yourself. Finn ultimately sides with Rose, pushing his character arc forward when he tells del Toro that he's wrong.

No point in bringing that character back for TROS, he fulfilled his brief purpose in the story and moved on.

 

[Chaoskitten]

So how y'all feel about star wars the rise of identity theft? I guess i'm an Obama now cause why the hell not right? Terrible movie

 

[matrix-cat]

Did we really need some long, drawn out explanation beyond that? Do we really need to know more about Rey's parents in order to understand Rey's conflict, which was thoroughly explored in TLJ already? Did we need the backstory of Owen and Beru to understand why Luke was ok with leaving for Alderaan with Obi-Wan? The movies give us more than enough to work with to understand the context of the situation our protagonists are in, and why they are in the mental states they are in during those moments of the film.

It's not even remotely an example of "extremely poor writing." I genuinely want to know what more should have been said about her parents. For me, it all seemed pretty clear, straightforward, and easy to connect the dots.

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The Palpatine reveal is the long, drawn out explanation. It's not that we need Wookieepedia articles on the parents, it's that we didn't need anything at all more on Rey's parents after TLJ. They were done. The parents aren't what's important, it's what the reveal means for Rey herself, and her having to come to grips with the idea that the loving parents she'd spent her life imagining actually sold her like scrap metal and that she'd have to find her own place in "all this" was already fertile ground for her character arc going into Episode IX.

But JJ didn't want to do it. He didn't want to do the character arc that had already been set up in the previous movie, so instead he went back and re-explained it a different way, shoehorned in some extra backstory to say, "No, actually...", and just replaced the arc he didn't like with one that he did. He brought back Palpatine and yada-yada-yada'd the explanation, copied the "Luke I am your father" reveal with two characters who'd never even met before, had Kylo claim he'd "never lied" to Rey while simultaneously delivering one of the most blatant retcons I've ever seen, and at the end of it we're just left with a weaker repeat of Luke's arc from the last trilogy. That'd be the extremely poor writing :P