Release Date: December 15, 2017
Watch Date: June 25, 2024
“In Lucasfilm’s Star Wars: The Last Jedi, the Skywalker saga continues as the heroes of Star Wars: The Force Awakens join the galactic legends in an epic adventure that unlocks new mysteries of the Force and shocking revelations of the past.”
Bob’s enjoyment of this trilogy is not getting better as time goes on, which is a real shame because they really aren’t as bad as all that.
Yes, look, if you had bought into the canon for a long time before Disney took over, if you’d invested a lot of time into it – this would probably suck. You’re watching these characters whose endings you knew, whose relationships you knew, whose extended families you knew, and you’re watching those stories be dismantled and the rules that were established change. But change is a part of life people, and Disney took over, and some Star Wars lore just isn’t canon anymore. In all fandoms we have to accept that there’s going to be things we just don’t like. I don’t love…well most of JK Rowling has added to the Harry Potter world. So I just don’t engage with that stuff.
Now, I accept that what JK Rowling adds is stuff in her tweets in between just extremely controversial statements and so it’s easier to dismiss and what Disney did was to make three movies focused primarily on the destruction of what a lot of Star Wars fans held very dear – but that’s only what it seems like.
‘The Last Jedi’ takes the torch from the old generation of Star Wars fans, and characters, and gives it to the new. Which is literally the purpose of the films. If you want your children to grow up loving Star Wars as much as you do, if you want them to have that experience of a fun space world with clear heroes and clear villains and redemption and magic powers (because like it or not that’s what the Force is), then yes, you could show them the old movies and hope. Or, you could expand that universe, make new stories.
All that said, no, I don’t like the relationship between Kylo and Rey. There doesn’t need to be romantic tension between the two leads, not in that way. Rey can just be a strong female lead, a Jedi who learns the ways of the Force, like Ahsoka before her. We don’t need to add a subplot. I think Luke could have been used a little bit better, and I bet they wouldn’t have put Leia in a coma for so long if they’d known what would happen before the third movie in the trilogy came out. I don’t understand Finn’s extremely strong attachment to Rey, a character he’s known for all of a few days considering it’s at most been a couple of weeks since they’ve known each other and he’s been in a coma for most of it.
A lot of comas in this movie.
I think Poe is annoying. I just do. He’s impulsive, he’s not the best leader for the Resistance and I don’t know why he’s given such deference by characters in leadership roles. I think Snoke’s ending was a little bit anticlimactic. Knowing what I know of the next film, I get it, but I didn’t know that when it first came out and it seems a little…eh. He was supposed to be this major player, he’s started a whole movement, he gets called The Supreme Leader, and he’s incredibly physically intimidating, and he’s taken out like he’s nothing. I also think Kylo Ren’s constant will he or won’t he turn from the dark side is a little bit stupid. It worked for Vader, in one movie, because you learned he had been good, you learned there was light, and if you watched the prequels you really understood that whole arc. For Kylo they just keep saying, his heart was already turned by Snoke. When? How did you know that? Was Snoke just hanging around your temple? What did Snoke have on him other than, be like Vader? Tell him what Vader was really like then. Get Anakin, the force ghost, or Obi-Wan to share that story!
But it’s a fun romp in space. There’s comedy, there’s a ton of action that – for as much as he says he dislikes this movie – Bob made me replay if taking care of me during my illness caused him to miss any. Yoda shows up! Which is always one of the best parts of a Star Wars trilogy, and BB8 is slowly becoming more and more tolerable. Plus Finn’s arc has been pretty well done up until this point, as long as you don’t pay attention to his motivations about Rey and just deal with him wanting to be as far from the war as possible, but also having a constant urge to do what’s right. Is this trilogy up there with the other two so far? No. But as far as getting my kids into it, and introducing the universe to others, you could do a lot worse.
Doc and Bob's Disney Adventure 
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