Star Wars Episode VIII: The Last Jedi was AWESOME!
I FREAKING LOVED THIS MOVIE by Sean Smith Art
If Star Trek fans are lovingly called “trekkies”, what are hardcore Star Wars fans called?
I wouldn’t know because although I have seen all 8 Star Wars films in the franchise thus far I can’t honestly call myself a hardcore fan. And I am actually quite thankful for that. Why? Because this allows me to look at the movies in the entire series as one continuous story that I am not emotionally attached to. I don’t go to the movies to find the art or the deeper meaning behind the metaphor on screen nor do I go to any movie just because it was made by the particular director or has this particular actor. I go to the movies for the same reason I read books: I like a good story. I want to be entertained. I want to set aside my own concerns and just for a time be in a world beyond my own. And the Star Wars franchise are films that fit that bill perfectly, to one extent or another.
I was left disappointed by the Prequels for the simple reason that I’m not a huge fan of CGI (at least, not to that extent) and I felt the writing was lackluster, leaving me groaning to the forced dialogue and constant walking discussions. Apparently no one ever has a serious chat over a Jedi-Mocha Latte and a scone. But they had their purpose. They filled in the backstory for Vader and the fall of the Republic to the Empire and I’m glad that they were made even if I wasn’t impressed by them.
Of course, the “Originals” are loved by pretty much everyone (myself included) and for good reason: they are imperfectly perfect films that immersed us completely into a galaxy beyond our own, one that had never been on the big screen before. I will always prefer the theatrical edition of these films because I liked the real, gritty feel that they hold and the additional CGI added years later made the films feel cheap and cluttered. But they too have their purpose. It was Lucas’ vision after all so although I don’t watch them, I don’t hate them either.
This brings us to the newest additions to the saga: The Force Awakens and The Last Jedi. My older brother Daniel went and saw The Last Jedi right after it came out and was not thrilled with it at all. He wrote a very detailed review explaining why and has since *sworn* that he will not watch episode 9. This left me a little apprehensive about the film but all the more excited to see it and find out for myself.
As I post this review, I will have seen The Last Jedi for the second time and have come to the absolute and final conclusion: I love it.
It was 2 ½ hours of awesomeness.
I’ve thought a lot about how to write this review. I can’t avoid spoilers (but, really, you should have seen it by now) but I don’t want this review to be 20 pages long either so I’ll try to keep it as simple as possible. First I will address the look and overall feel of the movie and then I will talk about the 4 character lines that are interconnected through the film and why I feel they work amazingly well.
Visually speaking, I loved the look and feel of this film. The balance of the practical versus digital effects was just right and it immersed you into a place that you felt could be real. Unlike in the prequels where the CGI was absolutely everywhere and it made the movies feel cheap and cartoonishly unreal, The Last Jedi employs the practical effects for the sets, locations, people, droids, aliens, fights etc as much as they can and only inserts CGI where absolutely necessary. And I will say that the CGI was pretty sharp and didn’t stick out like a sore thumb like the CGI in some more recent films I have seen. There were parts like the one with Leia “Force flying” back onto the bridge after being blown into space that felt a bit awkward but I can excuse that simply because we don’t know how the scene was created considering Carrie Fisher passed away before they had finished putting the film together AND she was in outer space and was most likely very frozen into that particular position so...yeah, I don’t know if the Force has a “thaw” setting.
Sorry.
Otherwise, the aerial and space fights were amazingly well put together and the one part where Admiral Holdo Lightspeed smashes the First Order ships?! That was SWEET! Even if this were a film in which I found issues with the writing or the cast or the acting, I couldn’t disregard the quality of production and the overall feel of the film. It was pleasing to the eyes and felt as real and believable as any film set in the far reaches of outer space could possibly feel.
Now it’s time to talk plot and characters. I’m going to break down each plot line and pull it all together in the end.
This should be fun.
And just a note: I use the terms “Rebellion” and “Resistance” interchangeably as they are one in the same. To me at least.
First up are Leia, Poe and the Resistance:
The movie begins with the Resistance and the First Order in battle. After toying with General Hux ( which was hilarious!), Poe Dameron (Oscar Isaac) destroys the cannons on the aptly named Dreadnought, allowing bombing ships to move in and take it out. The action, however brave, comes at a high cost to the Rebellion, placing General Leia Organa (Carrie Fisher) and Poe at odds, especially after she tells him off and demotes him for disregarding her orders to pull back from the bombing run. The tension on board the ship increases as they pull out of lightspeed and find the First Order right behind them and Leia is injured and in a coma following the attack. Admiral Holdo (Laura Dern) assumes command of the vessel and Poe begins to question the Admiral on their course of action, which she refuses to divulge. But with limited fuel and within shooting distance of the First Order, Poe is desperate to save the Rebellion and hatches a plan with Finn & Rose Tico (a mechanic on the ship), to get them aboard the Star Destroyer to deactivate the tracker attached to their ship so they can jump to lightspeed and hopefully save what is left of the Rebellion.
I have always liked Poe Dameron (and Oscar Isaac!) and I really loved his storyline in this movie. Although he was close to Leia and had been fighting alongside her for some time, as a fighter pilot he wouldn’t have been privy to the information shared amongst the officers on the deck (like Admiral Holdo) who were in command. On top of that, Holdo didn’t know him and had no reason to trust him, especially since he had just been demoted by Leia for disobeying orders. You can see in the film that Poe feels stuck, desperate to save the Rebellion, his friends, from total destruction. But he is admittedly a bit of a hot head and couldn’t see another way besides his own way out of their dire situation and he learns, through this experience and what follows on Crait, to keep his head together and think through a situation before rushing out to blow things up, which had been his default up until this point. Poe is a prime example of someone rising to a leadership position because he is, in fact, a natural born leader, the kind of person that the military wants in a leadership positions, ones who are willing to take risks in order to win the war but is smart enough to know when and if the risk is worth the cost.
It would appear that even if Carrie Fisher hadn’t passed away so suddenly (Rest in Peace, General) that Poe was going to take over as leader of the Resistance effort. And they couldn’t have picked a better one.
Next, we have Rose Tico & Finn:
As you might remember, Finn (John Boyega) is severely injured by Kylo Ren in Episode 7, leaving him recovering in a coma when Rey leaves to find Luke Skywalker. He awakens after the Rebellion jumps to light speed, wondering where Rey is. After their ship is attacked and Leia injured, Finn finds the device Leia was going to use to contact Rey (once they made it to their next base) and makes the rather rash decision to jump aboard an escape pod, fly as far away as he could and then contact Rey so she would be back with him but out of danger. But before he can sneak away, he is stunned by a mechanic named Rose Tico (Kelly Marie Tran) who had just lost her older sister in the Dreadnought bombing run and was in no mood for deserters like Finn. However, it becomes apparent to both that they cannot escape from the First Order without first disabling the tracker on board the Star Destroyer. Finn has the knowledge of the ship and Rose has the skills to disable it but they need a master coder (or hacker) to get them onto the ship and into the tracker room. With the help of Poe (and Maz Kanata who tells them where to find the hacker), they make their way to Canto Bight, a city of pleasure for the wealthy, most specifically the wealthy who have made their money from the brutal war between the Rebellion and the First Order. Before they can make contact with the master coder that they needed, they are arrested and thrown into prison but are able to make their escape with the help of an eccentric thief (played by Benicio DelToro) who agrees to help them in exchange for pay. With his help Finn, Rose and BB-8 reach the tracker but are captured and the thief sells the Rebellion escape plan to the First Order, leaving Finn and Rose to be executed while they watch their friends get blown away.
For this story line with Finn, I found that Rose was the bright spot in what would otherwise be considered a terrible, dark place not just for the Rebellion but for Finn.
Rose was raised on a mining type planet that was stripped of its ore by the First Order and then shelled for practice but she had a family and knew what it was like to love and be loved, even in the midst of the horrors of war. She joined the Rebellion with her sister not solely because she hated the First Order (which she surely did) but because she wanted to protect what she loved and help others do the same.
On the other hand, Finn never knew a family and was raised from childhood to be a Stormtrooper, to obey orders and to kill for the First Order. Finn has never known anything except the First Order and the Resistance, both of which have meant death, fear and destruction. As the storyline progresses and Finn learns about what happened to Rose’s home, how the jerk-faces on Canto Bight made their money and even learning that those jerks serve both sides, his rage and determination to not let the First Order win builds to the point of him wanting to sacrifice himself on Crait, to keep “them” from winning again.
But Rose stops him.
When he is pulling her from her wrecked ship, he can’t understand why she would do that. He was almost there, he was going to take out the cannon, he was going to save the rebellion, why would she stop him?!
As sappy as it might sound, when you fight any war or any battle you don’t fight because you hate what’s in front of you. You fight for your loved ones you left behind and for those you love who fight by your side. And even though Finn’s “Medal of Honor Run” was taken from him, he learned there is more in this world besides pain, suffering and destruction. He, even at this moment, is taken back by Rose’s selflessness (as he is many times throughout their adventure), even through all she has suffered, and as the movie comes to an end and he sits next to her unconcious figure, it’s like he finally understands why these people fight and why he will fight too. He’s not going to run anymore. Now, he really has a reason to stay.
On a side note, you know that part when he is fighting Phasma and she tells him he was always scum and he responds, “Rebel Scum.”? My husband and I may have high fived ‘cause that was freaking awesome.
Next up: Luke Skywalker
When we leave Rey and Luke at the end of Episode 7, we have no idea how Luke is going to react to Rey suddenly appearing on his island. What is he thinking? Will he train Rey and help her become a Jedi?
To my own surprise and possibly the surprise of the audience, Luke (Mark Hammill) is anything but cordial to Rey. In fact, he tosses aside the lightsaber she hands him and effectively ignores her after she first arrives. There isn’t a passage of time given but it seems that Rey was there for some time before the whole First-Order-Tracking-debacle happens with the Rebellion. During that time, Rey trails him all over the island, confronts him several times and begs for his help but he refuses. He’s very surly and impudent to her and Rey patiently waits for him to stop being a jerk, while she worries about her friends far off amongst the stars.
The story between these two begins like all the other days on this little island. She is following Luke through his daily routine of collecting milk from the weird sea-cow things (thala-sirens) and fishing for some pretty sick-looking fish, when the world around her grows quiet and she hears something speaking, hushed voices in the distance. She turns around to see a structure shrouded in fog (it’s a very wet and foggy island) and heads towards it. This captures Luke’s attention and he follows her to what we find out to be the Jedi Temple, complete with Sacred Jedi texts.
Neat.
He asks, in a very direct and strong fashion, who she is and why she has come there. As he would no longer accept her tired line of “The Resistance sent me” she laments and tells him that something inside her, something that has always been there is awake and she’s terrified. She has no idea what it is, how to control it and needs help to understand it and figure out where she fits in all this. Luke recognizes that she needs a teacher but he refuses, insisting that he would never train another generation of Jedi. But Luke’s love for his sister and his desire to help her wins out and he agrees to give Rey 3 lessons that will help her become a Jedi.
Lesson #1: The Force is the connection between all things, the balance between life and death, light and dark, good and evil. The Jedi practice it as an artform (or religion) but you don’t have to “be a Jedi” or have “Jedi lineage” to feel, have and use the Force.
Lesson #2: The Jedi have become legends in the minds of the people, incapable of making mistakes or being flawed but it is because of their complacency that brought on the rise of the Empire and Darth Vader and his own failure that turned Ben Solo into Kylo Ren. The collective failure of the Jedi has literally killed people and you cannot (and should not) depend solely on the Jedi to bring peace to the the universe.
Ouch.
The 3rd lesson was never reached because the true reason as to why Luke was hiding on that tiny island was finally revealed.
During the failure lesson, he tells Rey that when he confronted Ben about his growing connection to the Dark Side, Ben attacked him, left him for dead, destroyed the training temple and killed some of his students. But in reality, as Luke stood over the sleeping Ben Solo, he could sense that the seed of darkness had spread beyond his control. In a moment of very, very human weakness, he drew his lightsaber with the feeling that he could snuff it out and end the darkness right then and there. As soon as the thought came to him, however, it passed leaving nothing behind but shame. Unfortunately, that moment of weakness “killed” Ben Solo and Kylo Ren took his place. Luke not only failed Ben Solo, he failed as a Master and as a Jedi and couldn’t bear to face his sister whose child he had just pushed over the edge into the darkness. He couldn’t save Ben. He couldn’t save anyone. So he hid, awaiting the day he would die and be released from his shame and grief.
Shortly after this truth is revealed and Rey had left to try and save Ben Solo (that’s coming up next), Luke marches with flare in hand to burn down the Jedi temple and encounters Yoda who beats him to the punch and literally brings down lightning and sets the Temple aflame. While Luke panics over the loss of the Sacred Jedi texts (none of which Luke had read, it would seem) Yoda informs Luke (in his most adorable Yoda way) to stop living in the past, to learn and teach from his mistakes (failure really is the best teacher) and to get off his butt and get to work.
He’s a good master like that.
I love this story line with Luke because, when it comes to the Jedi and their “perfection”, I agree with him. It’s total fabrication. The idea that just because someone is a Jedi doesn’t mean they are super special or impervious to the things that plague mankind (or whatever alien type said Jedi is). The Jedi are, after all, not devoid of feeling or emotion and they all have flaws that must be worked on just like the rest of us mere mortals. Power never means perfection, no matter who you are. In his lifetime, Luke helped bring down the murderous Empire, redeemed his Father in his final moments and was made a legend across the universe for his efforts but even with all the good he had done, all the praise sung to his name, he couldn’t look past his mistake with Ben Solo because the damage fell so close to home. He had betrayed his own beliefs and teachings in a moment of weakness and hurt dearly the ones he loved the most.I appreciate his humanity here. It makes him feel real, a Jedi that we can sympathize with and relate to. I understand that people might think, “Luke Skywalker would never do that” but, in reality, you never know what’ll push someone over the edge and for Luke, the damage his weakness inflicted on his family and to those he was Master to, was enough. Every person will deal with grief and/or shame in their own way and, although he ran from the repercussions of his failure and wallowed in his sorrow and grief for a time, he came round and did the right thing in the end. He is Luke F-ing Skywalker, after all.
As the situation on Crait had become a desperate last ditch effort for the Resistance, with no help in sight, Luke appears at the base. He says his piece to his sister Leia (it’s a very sweet goodbye) and marches out of the base to meet the much unhinged Kylo Ren. He apologizes to Kylo for failing him as a Master but in his last moments, tells him that the war against the First Order had just begun and that he is not the last Jedi, that there will always be the good to rise up against the darkness. Luke knew it was true and with his burden lifted, his work done and what was left of the Rebellion safely tucked away on the Falcon, Luke fades away, back into the Force as fitting for the Jedi Master he was.
And just like the his own Jedi masters, I have a feeling he will be back.
And finally, the part of the film I sincerely enjoyed probably a bit too much: Rey & Kylo Ren.
Before heading off to the theater to see The Last Jedi, I re-watched The Force Awakens to refresh myself on the story. When I first saw it, I kept thinking that Kylo Ren was way too concerned about “the girl” who was helping BB-8 and Finn escape from the First Order. It was almost like he was aware of her in some way, like her appearance wasn’t necessarily a surprise. Most people assumed that she must be his sister or his cousin or something but that didn’t feel right to me. The Last Jedi didn’t answer all of questions I had but it made the picture a bit clearer and I just love it.
While Rey is following Luke around his island, Kylo Ren is fighting the conflict within himself. He has just killed his father (which did not have the desired effect her was looking for), he was bested by that random scavenger girl from Jakku and his master, Supreme Leader Snoke (Andy Serkis) is tormenting him with suggestions that Kylo Ren was not the right choice to take the place of Darth Vader. Angry and out to prove himself, he takes off in his ship to attack the Resistance vessel but cannot bring himself to kill his mother. He just can’t. His combination of anger, fear, weakness and loneliness is proving to be a dangerous combination and you can see he is becoming more and more unstable.
When Rey awakens the morning of her first Jedi lesson with Luke, we see Kylo Ren having his Rey-induced face injury repaired by medical bots. The sound slowly shifts to silence as Rey and Kylo realize they are not alone and as they turn, they see each other. Rey’s first instinct is to fire her weapon at Kylo, which he reacts to but isn’t injured as he isn’t actually there. Kylo speaks first, trying to figure out where Rey is and why the Force is
connecting them but Rey is anything but helpful and when Luke appears, the connection ends.
The Force connects them several more times, always with a shift in sound from reality to a focused silence, with Rey calling him a Monster (and he affirming it), she taunting him with much “I Won. You Lost” and he asking repeatedly if Luke had told her what happened “that night”. After the “Jedi Failure” lesson, the Force connects them again and Rey is just beside herself. In tears, she demands to know why Kylo hated his father, Han Solo. His father loved him, he cared about him so why would Kylo kill him? Kylo reservedly insists that he didn’t hate his father (no truer sentence was ever spoken) but compares his father, his own parents to her parents who just threw her away and yet she still seeks them out. He asks again if Luke had told her what happened. When she responds “Yes” (in a tearful but very stubborn and “in your face” sort of way), Kylo tells her that she didn’t know what really happened and the connection ends.
At this point, Rey seeks out the dark part of the island from her first lesson with Luke, the one she had seen and felt it calling to her, hoping it will give her an answer to what she had so long been seeking: her parents.
Later, as she warms herself in her hut, Rey is visibly shaken, speaking out loud, talking about what she saw in this dark cave and how alone she felt, how alone she really was. We hear Kylo Ren say, “You’re not alone”. As they talk, Rey reaches out her hand to Kylo who takes care in removing his glove and reaches out to her. As their hands touch, they both see something (which we don’t get to see, dang it!) at which point Luke comes into the hut and sees the two sitting there, connected. The connection breaks and Rey and Luke fight each other, with Rey winning and finally getting the truth about “that night” from Luke. She then insists that she had a vision that Kylo Ren, still conflicted and in pain, turned to the light and if she went to him now, it could turn the tide of the war.
On board Snokes ship, Snoke tortures and torments Rey and then orders Kylo Ren to kill her. Rey and Kylo face each other, the two of them no longer strangers and enemies, and just as he is preaching about Kylo Ren killing his greatest enemy, Kylo turns the lightsaber on Snoke and slices him in half.
YES!
I like the idea of a “Force Connection” between people in the Star Wars universe. If the Force is the connection between all things, then why not people? Leia and Luke had a connection and Darth Vader was able to contact Luke in the same manner. And this connection between Rey and Kylo Ren is no different even better so since it was *seemingly* just the Force connecting them for a reason that neither of them could decipher. I don’t necessarily buy that Snoke “bridged their minds” but he took credit and that invasion of privacy was enough for Kylo to *cut him* from his life.
Too soon?
The conversations between Rey and Kylo Ren felt personal and real. You could really feel the chemistry between the two characters. And it was shot in just the right way that it felt like they were talking to each other in the same room rather than on opposite sides of the universe. It seems fitting that these two people who are lonely in their own ways, seeking happiness, purpose and their proper place in the vast universe in which they reside would connect and stay connected. The connection brought down the masks and walls that were up between the two and allowed them to see their enemy as a person, a person much like themselves. Just as there is balance needed in the Force and amongst all things within the universe, people need balance too and Rey and Kylo Ren seemingly were that to one another.
The first few times they connected Rey is releasing her anger towards Kylo, letting her emotions fly while he is quiet in his response and patient, almost like he craves the conversation, even an angry one. He encourages her to say things out loud that are difficult which for Rey was something she had never really done. Being abandoned and living a lonely and harsh life in the deserts of Jakku might do that to a person. After Rey returns from the “Dark Side Cave of Wonders”, it would appear that she sought out Kylo, wanting to speak with him and as they make there way to Snoke, she calls him Ben (which visibly hit home for him) and wants to help him return to the light. Rey obviously has a big heart and wants to do the right thing but she isn’t dumb and wouldn’t have gone to try and save Kylo if she didn’t feel like there was something there to work with, especially after what she had seen him do to Han.
After their sweet battle against the Praetorian Guard, Kylo asks Rey to stay with him. He tells her that in his vision he had of her joining him on the Dark Side, he saw her parents and asks her if she wants to know the truth or if she had always known. Crying, she acknowledged that they were nobody. She had always known it. Kylo interjects that they sold her for drinking money and that even though she was nobody of significance anywhere else, that she meant something to him. When he offers her his hand and says “Please” this was a moment of vulnerability. He wasn’t lying about her parents and he wasn’t trying to manipulate her. In that moment he was was not Kylo Ren. He was Ben Solo and he needed her. He knew it and she knew it. So when she inevitably rejects his offer and returns to her Resistance friends, he is once again left painfully alone. He is thrown back into his Kylo Ren persona and his instability returns and boy, does it show!
Rey and Kylo Ren are two sides of the same coin which was why their Force connection was so significant. Both individuals were or felt betrayed and abandoned by their parents but choose completely different paths in order to deal with that: Kylo Ren chose the Dark side, power and control over family. Rey chose the light, seeking out the good, creating her own family and helping others. When you see their last Force connection, right after Kylo Ren attacks and storms the Rebel base on Crait, you recognize that Rey has become both his weakness and his strength. In the most subtle ways, he really wants to be Ben Solo but he’s too far in now to turn back on his own. Even though Rey physically and metaphorically shuts the door on him in this final connection, she is still there waiting to help him back to the light and Ren’s crestfallen face in that last moment of that final connection says it all.
Also, did anyone notice the way General Hux was looking at Kylo Ren there at the end?
I’m thinking that Rey might actually be coming to Kylo’s rescue in episode 9.
Seriously. Hux has it out for him.
The Last Jedi is exactly what I look for in a movie and it might actually be my favorite Star Wars movie. It was entertaining, engaging and just the right level of painful and lovely to make me yearn for the next installment. I can’t look at this movie and think this is simply a “money grab” because the film was obviously made by people who respected and cared for the material and the Star Wars universe. This is the story they wanted to tell and even if hard core fans didn’t like it for whatever nit-picky reason, it was a great story, told strongly and with conviction. I felt that the characters (Poe, Finn, Rey, Luke & Kylo Ren) were each exposed as the flawed person they were and by the end set on the path to reaching their potential and final purpose. I didn’t feel like anything was missing from their development and I both rooted for and sympathized with them. The original movies don’t spend a lot of time within the Rebellion and their struggles-we are mostly focused on Luke becoming a Jedi as well as the relationship between Han and Leia-and as much as it hurt to watch the Rebellion get their butts handed to them on a bloody platter, I felt that it was fitting and a smart move on the part of the creators. The Rebellion lost that battle. Badly. But the war is far from over for them. I’m thinking (or rather hoping) that the next movie will jump forward a bit in time which’ll give the Rebellion time to rebuild, for the First Order to grow weary of Kylo Ren’s instability and for Rey to receive more Jedi instruction from Luke’s Jedi Spirit or something.
I can’t wait to see them again in episode 9 and see how far they have come.
But if Rey and Ben Solo don’t end up together, I will be sad.
Just sayin’.
