THE LAST JEDI. My spoiler-filled observations.

Here are some great lines from our favourite heroes in EMPIRE STRIKES BACK:

"That's right, and my friend's out in it..."

"We have to go back, I know where Luke is..."

"I can't get the vision out of my head, they're my friends, I've gotta help them." 

The biggest-I’ll repeat-- the biggest blunder this new trilogy makes is starting from the premise that Luke and Han, best friends and decorated heroes of the rebellion, each of whom never had a real family but always stayed loyal and steadfast to their friends and their cause even to the point of death and destruction, freezing, annihilation and the end of all hope-- those guys, the guys we dressed up like and pretended to be because they were brave and selflessness and freed the galaxy from catastrophe-- those guys-- both of them-- Han Solo and Luke Skywalker completely quit when it got too hard.

They quit on marriage, parenthood, mentorship, responsibility, duty, guardianship-- hell, one even contemplated murdering his nephew in his sleep. Han gave all the above up to chase Rathtars. Luke set off for a peaceful daily life of drinking alien milk.

Rian Johnson turned Luke Skywalker into a broken, guilt-crippled, cynical intergalactic Big Lebowski who leaves his sister to fight a war by herself. Han Solo? A debt-ridden absent father and husband who leaves his wife to-- you guessed it-- fight a war by herself. Our favourite characters no longer have a moral centre or any feeling of responsibility to one another. That entire idea is sooooo passe. We no longer know who in the hell these characters are. In fact, they are completely unrecognizable from who we knew them to be based on how they previously faced challenges together in service to one another. 

Why should I have ever expected anything different? We now live in the era of the whiny, moody, sullen, hopeless Superman. Of course, we got the cowardly, absent Han Solo, now along comes the morally crippled Luke Skywalker.

This is the foundational weakness of the whole new saga. I feel cheated and pissed and depressed and disappointed and angry. I guess I really should have seen this coming. Every time they would ask Mark Hamill about it in interviews, there was a hesitation and a brow-furrowing as if he's going "how exactly do I say this without pissing off the execs…??” But he’s Mark Hamill, dammit. So he said it:

“I at one point had to say to Rian, ‘I pretty much fundamentally disagree with every choice you’ve made for this character. Now, having said that, I have gotten it off my chest, and my job now is to take what you’ve created and do my best to realize your vision.’ ” 

Some vision. Hamill was right. Johnson scripted the dumbest, most insulting, most illogical use of the single most iconic Star Wars character in the saga. They had one shot to do it right and they whiffed big time.

So let me get this straight- just so I got this: LUKE SKYWALKER, A JEDI MASTER who believed in the tiny sliver of goodness within his genocidal war criminal space wizard father and redeemed him through sheer faith and devotion and love and selflessness and proved that love can destroy an empire, grew powerful enough to train a new generation, but suddenly WANTED TO KILL HIS OWN TEENAGE NEPHEW IN HIS SLEEP.

But then he somehow wasn't powerful enough to defend himself from the creepy sleepy emo nephew's force attack. Yet the mysterious Rey --WITH NO TRAINING AND NO TIES TO THE SKYWALKER FAMILY AND NO ANYTHING-- beats Kylo Ren in a lightsaber duel in The Force Awakens and then beats Luke's ass on the island... with a stick.

This film was written by a committee of latte-sipping global marketing execs--and Abrams and Kasdan--aided and abetted by Johnson, who-- in his defence-- had to reverse-engineer a justification for Luke to be out of the fight for so long. He chose... guilt. 

So, Johnson wrote Luke a galaxy-altering moment of uncharacteristic... what? Weakness? Fury? Fear? Aggression? That sets off something horrible-- you know what? Fine. But here’s the thing: Heroes face that shit. They confront growing evil. They don't stand creepily over sleeping kids. They face adversity, they personally question, challenge and get everything out in the open and stand up for what's right in the light of day.

Like an educator saying "I thought this kid was capable of precipitating a violent incident, so I stood over his sleeping body with a 9mm handgun-- but you know, just for a second-- and when I came to my senses he woke up and attacked me." WHAT THE FUUUU

But I could have dealt with all of it if they had just made Luke actually risk something by going to Crait and physically standing in the way of the First Order. To protect the sister he risked everything for waaaaay back when he was a young farm boy and she was a complete stranger to him. To stand up for justice and get back in the fight.

He could have whipped up a giant salt-storm, caused a force-induced earthquake, made lightning rain down, fought and died at the hands of Kylo and a barrage of AT-At fire... and I would have felt like he worked through something, atoned for a sin he would never have committed in the first place. (Know how I know he wouldn’t have? Because he turned his lightsaber off when faced with a much tougher and more critical choice over 35 years ago. It’s called internal logic.)

But... no. Alas. We don’t even get that. Because he's a hologram. A force projection. How is the audience supposed to recognize that and suddenly justify his death? I was shocked and confused by it all. I was like...."You're kidding me right now... we are doing this now? He's dying from this?” I could almost see the crisp, white Starbucks coffee cups and the yellow legal pads of the Disney execs as they took it all in in the meeting:

 “He dies? Luke dies? LOVE that. LOVE it. Hamill is a pain in the ass anyway. So the middle-aged fans in the 35-65 bracket will have a quick cathartic moment and we can do the twin sunset thing too because symmetry. Rian, you’re brilliant. Can we also have Rey say something about Luke dying with ‘peace and purpose?’ You know, have her say it right to the audience in just those exact words? I’d really like to add that, you know our mantra, ‘tell, don’t show.’ Ok now that we’ve checked that box, we can move on to some real storytelling in episode-- what is it now, nine? I can’t remember, they’re all alike. (Laughter from the group) Can we see those new plush Porg toy prototypes now? Greaaaaaaat.”

Johnson cut every single set-up spike Abrams left him. Snoke? NOPE. Rey’s parentage? NAH BRO JUNKERS. Luke gives up the force and the Jedi order? Oh, ok. THEN WHY IS HE WEARING JEDI ROBES WHEN WE SEE HIM FIRST? WHY DOES HE CHANGE INTO A DIFFERENT OUTFIT RIGHT AWAY? WHY DOES HE LOOK AT REY AS IF HE KNOWS WHAT HAPPENED TO HAN AT THE END OF TFA?

And don't get me started on the incompetent, ridiculous resistance and their illogical internal politics/strategy and the Battlestar-Galactica-ripoff-fuel-cris-slow-motion chase and the joke’s-on-General-Hux-he’s-soooo-goofy routine.

Seriously, though. If you want to move in a new direction, tie up the fates of our beloved characters with resonant, emotional payoffs. Make them care enough to actually do something. Then let them go and introduce new characters. But I don't give a shit about anyone new because they are market research cutouts and I don't feel a thing for them.

The whole plot of the movie from both the first order and the resistance POV:

a.) KILL THE PAST 

and

b.) BUY MORE TIME FOR SOMEONE TO HAVE A FREAKING IDEA. 

That's a window into the decision-making process that went on in this film. ...and it shows.


RANDOM BLASTS: 

-Poe Dameron would be shot for mutiny, but Leia's like "he's so cute, isn't he?"

-Admiral Jurassic Park could have told Poe 'CHILL, WE HAVE A PLAN' at ANY TIME IN THE 3 HOURS

-Admiral Ackbar is dead. Ok. thanks…??

-If you can get off the ship to go to Vegas or Atlantic city to find a 'codebreaker' WHY CAN'T EVERYONE GO TO VEGAS, JUST PUT EVERYONE ON THAT SHIP WHAT THE FUCK

-If you can use ships as hyperspace missiles and cripple First Order Dreadnoughts WHY NOT SET THE SHIP'S AUTOPILOT TO DO SO WHILE YOU GUYS ESCAPE

-With TFA I knew Harrison Ford wanted out, but I thought they'd make Kylo conflicted-- so they get to a moment where he won't kill Leia… and he decides not to-- but thennnn… NAHHH KILL EVERYBODY TAKE NO PRISONERS

-NOT ONE SCENE between Kylo and his mom. For all the familial ties in the saga, these guys sure pass up opportunities for dramatic conflict

-YODA? WHYYYYYY

-ROSE- Cool character, good performance. But I desperately want to see a deeply resonant plotline about the relationship between siblings and their names are LUKE AND LEIA

-LUKE was the maguffin, initially-- it was like WE HAVE TO FIND LUKE and the first order was like NO WE HAVE TO FIND SKYWALKER FIRST-- IT IS PARAMOUNT!!! in this one, the First Order is like "Ummm... Wait until they run out of gas or something..."

 -NO FINN DON'T SACRIFICE YOURSELF BECAUSE THAT WOULD BE BAD MEANWHILE THE SUPERCANNON IS GONNA KILL EVERYONE WHATEVER, KISS ME

-GENERAL LEIA, NOBODY IS ANSWERING THE CALL TO RALLY AROUND THE RESISTANCE SORRY
NO WAIT YOUR BROTHER IS SKYPING US
HE LEFT YOU THESE DICE WHICH WILL SHOW UP IN THE HAN SOLO PREQUEL MOVIE (GET YOUR TICKETS NOW EVERYONE)
BUT THEY AREN'T REAL DICE AND THEY MEAN NOTHING WHICH IS WHY YOU LEAVE THEM BEHIND FOR YOUR MURDEROUS SON TO FIND
AND THEY WILL DISAPPEAR BECAUSE IT IS ALL MEANINGLESS GET IT??
GET ITTTTT???
LET THE PAST DIE FOLKS
BUY PORGS FOR THE KIDS THIS HOLIDAY SEASON

I never ever in a million years thought I would find myself writing this about a Star Wars film, but "Where do they go from here"is met with a resounding WHOOOOO CARES.