Star Wars! Spoilers Allowed So Beware!

Considering that the resistance is pretty much down to the one fleet, and later one ship, being stripped of his rank isn't the same as it would be in a full military. If it was a big deal, put him in the brig. If it's not, just tell him that there is a plan, but the details are secret.

Rey is also the Chosen One, destined and all that. It's just that now instead of being immaculate conception by the force, it's being picked by the force. Anakin's parents didn't matter after all. Luke wasn't a Chosen One, just a farm boy with potential.

 

I feel like putting him in the brig was a luxury they didn’t have under the circumstances. Regardless, they made it quite clear that he was on the shit list, which means even if he’d normally be entitled to getting filled in on why he’s supposed to be following orders from a superior officer, he wasn’t anymore.

Of course, I don’t think they realized he was going to commit mutiny if he didn’t get said explanation.

That’s definitely not true. Even from A New Hope they made it clear that Luke was following in his father’s footsteps, and Anakin’s basically the Jedi version of the virgin birth. While I suppose the one who chooses isn’t the right term, someone who’s chosen not because of who her parents are but because of who she is still appeals to me.

 

Nobody else on the ship was informed that there was a plan, not just Poe. Everybody thought the commander was doing nothing and were only following because she was the ranking officer. And he didn't commit mutiny alone.

Luke following in his father's footsteps is not nearly at the same level as Rey is in Chosen One-ness. The Force is making her into a counter to Kylo. Luke didn't get that. He won, not because he was the chosen one, but because he appealed to his father. Vader's love for his son beat his loyalty to evil. Luke suffered and failed until the end, when he finally was winning he saw that beating Vader would lead him to the dark side.

 

Most of the crew didn’t mutiny, though. If people didn’t trust that she had a plan besides “run and hope” then you wouldn’t expect anyone to listen to her. Which makes it feel like it’s an intentional part of his character arc - he doesn’t trust other peoples’ decisions, so he discounts the possibility of a plan rather than assuming she has one.

I mean, I think it depends on how you see the Force acting. I don’t feel like she’s gotten some kind of powerup beyond the mix of being strong with the force, having a mildly improbable set of skills that still falls within action movie standards, and having some damn lucky coincidences - which is about the same thing Luke had when he started his journey.

Not to mention that I wouldn’t exactly say Rey’s record is any better than Luke’s when it comes to successes. Remember, the first movie ends with him and the Rebellion about as triumphant as is possible under the circumstances.

Welcome to the Prequel Trilogy.

 

If we were pre TLJ I might've agreed, however we are post TLJ so you're wrong.

 

Is this the point where I go “nuh-uh” and you go “yuh-huh”?

 

The instant Poe knows there's actually a plan he goes with it 100%. He's still allowed on the bridge. It's designed to create a conflict where it isn't needed, and it's contrived. A simple 'Yes' on her part would have prevented ~60% of the film from existing. The reasoning for keeping him that far out of the loop is not sound.

With Luke, he was already a capable starship pilot, (bullseye Womprats with a T-16) which explains his piloting ability. Previous to training with Yoda, he barely managed to pull a lightsaber to him, during a moment of distress. Rey learns the Jedi mind trick basically by accident. She could barely believe that it actually worked. Luke didn't even actually train her, but she could still outdo him in the magnitude of her force powers. While she had never piloted a starship of any kind, she could still fly the Falcon, a ship even Luke didn't instantly know the controls to. She even beats Han in maintaining the Falcon, fixing a problem by removing a compressor. (If you removed the compressor in a car, it would work but reduce the horsepower, assuming the compressor is like a supercharger/turbocharger. So what did that compressor do anyways?)

 

No, this is the point where I point out that by TLJ Rey has accumulated far more successes than failures than either Anakin or Luke before her in their second outing while facing incredibly diminished challenge and defeats so minor they might as well not have happened at all for all that they effected her.

 

I don’t feel like it’s contrived, though. It’s a standard person versus person - a hot-shot who’s used to doing things his way in conflict with a vice-admiral who's accustomed to people following the chain of command. That’s much more interesting, to me, than the movie going out of its way to cater to the hot-shot’s personality issues.

Luke is a farm-boy who’s hobby is taking joyrides in a hot rod. That’s a far cry from piloting a starfighter - it’s like someone who’s good at driving a hot rod being an ace fighter pilot. Which is about the same background as Rey, who pilots her speeder on what I can assume is a daily basis. She’s also been scavenging to survive her whole life, so I’d be more surprised if she didn’t have some intensive mechanical knowledge. As for the mind-trick, she just got her mind probed by Kylo - that’s better than hands-on experience, that’s brain-on experience. It’s a step or two more plausible than suddenly developing telekinesis.

From what I recall, her accomplishments in TLJ were getting thrown around like a psychokinetic toy, playing clean-up for Kylo in the fight against Snoke’s guards, breaking a lightsaber, and clearing a bunch of rocks. Meanwhile, she failed at what she actually set out to do - Snoke could have effortlessly killed her if he didn’t give the job to Kylo, and her attempt at use his struggling loyalty to pull him back to the light ended up cementing his allegiance to the dark side. That’s about as abject as failure can get.

She’s still got her hand, I suppose. So I guess point for you there.

 

Well, let's just take these one at a time shall we?

Coming out none the worse for wear and with the more experienced dark side user dead.

"Clean up" in this case meaning that she was able to fight off three trained light weapon users at once and needing to bail Kylo out.

Stalemating a force user with at least a decade of experience with no training of her own.

Removing boulders that neither Luke or Anakin could've managed at that level, saving the resistance. Or at least what was left of it.

Once again resulting in the death of Kylo's far more experienced and powerful master leaving Kylo Ren and Hux in charge of the first order.

So abject failure? No, not even slightly.

Also!

This is the T-16.

It is the craft that Luke flew. the rebel alliance also uses it to train people to fly the X-Wing because X-Wing uses a similar set up.

 

Yes, a Vice Admiral whom people had so much faith in her they had to post an armed guard at the escape shuttles.

Let me be clear - Admiral Purple Hair didn't have to tell Poe fuck all. Nothing. Nada. What she DID have to do was demonstrate basic military leadership 101, and let everyone know that they weren't on the ship of the damned, she did have a plan, trust in your mates, and we'll get through this.

That entire little subplot, quite bluntly, confuses the hell out of me. It makes no sense - well. It CAN make sense, but I'm not sure if my conclusions were what the director/writers were going for, and bluntly, TLJ hasn't exactly inspired much faith in me in that direction.

 

Because she literally got saved from death by that more experienced dark side user. She was at his mercy. She lost, Kylo was the one who won.

Considering that her fights are primarily one on one while he’s holding his own against multiple at once, I’d say yes, she’s mopping up.

They literally break the weapon fighting over it, I wouldn’t call that a win.

I might not be remembering it correctly, but I only recall Luke struggling with boulders before his training scene, and I don’t recall any scenes with Anakin struggling.

Again, that was all Kylo. She wanted to turn him, and she failed so completely that he turned the wrong way around. From any objective standard, she failed; the fact that he then Sithed his master doesn’t change that fact.

It’s an airspeeder. The wiki specifically calls it an airspeeder, not a starship. Yes, the X-Wing controls might have been retconned to be based on the T-16, but if we’re allowing novelization retcons then Rey got retconned into looting a flight simulator system and playing with it as much as Luke played with his speeder.

I mean, how often do people just assume the officer in command doesn’t have any idea what they’re doing? A couple of people did jump ship, but the vast majority assumed basic competence. Which, I think, is the issue I have with the Holdo question at all - it only works from Poe’s perspective. If you assume she’s incompetent and that the cocky fighter pilot is always right, then yes, he deserves an explanation for why she’s not doing it his way. But if you take it from even a neutral perspective, where she’s a decorated veteran and he just got demoted for insubordination, that demand is outright insulting.

 

At one point three of them attack her at once, at another one of the fighters had a perfect opening to stab her in the back but somehow lost his other dagger.

It's not a loss either! Which is the point! She had no training force and yet she's able to match this guy who is her opposite but has years on her!

What's it going to be like when she actually does get training in the force?

A) Luke wasn't lifting as many boulders as she was nor were the rocks he did lift that big

B) Luke had been practicing the basics that Obi-Wan had taught him for three years and he had an actual Jedi Master teaching him, what did Rey have again?

C) You didn't see Anakin having trouble using the force because by the time of AotC he'd been a practicing Force user for years.

No, it just means that her primary threats are now a person she's already been able to match and a guy who falls for your mama jokes.

Firstly, can you really call it a retcon if the book was released before the movie?

Secondly, Rey being able to loot a simulator doesn't automatically mean that she should be able to pilot the extremely customized Falcon.

Here's the thing; in the aftermath of the bridge getting spaced Po is one of the few remaining officers, that he recently ate a demotion is irrelevant in the face of the fact that he's one of the few of the command staff remaining.

And in situations of crisis it's important for commanders to keep their officers informed of the plan so that they act accordingly.

But rather than tell Po or seemingly anyone the plan she acts snidely to the man who blew up Star Killer station saving the resistance and behaving like there was no plan whatsoever.

It gets to the point where's he able to cause a mutiny and... no one apparently objects to it. They don't get any push back on this until Leia wakes up. That is not the sign of a good leader. That's not the sign of competent leader.

 

Not really. How many times have we seen in military fiction the idea of 'you must have the respect of your men to lead them'? It's a cliche for a reason, because in part, it's true.

And the directing during that scene! From the camera and shot angles, it was pretty clear how they were setting everything up; Admiral Dresses was setup to be smug, superior, and condescending, always looking down on Po-Po during the entire scene.

Not exactly, I'll note, the best way to tear a strip off someone who just pulled a military fuckup.

Plus, re-check that mutiny scene. The command staff was pretty even split. The only reason it really stopped is because Princess Leia Poppins woke up.

And, again, you miss the entire point of my argument. Starfighter Jock Quote The Raven doesn't deserve or require ANY explanation from Miss Purple Hair, but that doesn't mean she didn't need to LEAD. You know, as the resident military leader. Which she pretty much failed at.

 

I might have to rewatch the scene, but what I remember is that after the initial back-to-back fight, all of her battles are one-on-one while Kylo is facing multiple at a time.

She matches him for a short period of time before they destroy the object they’re fighting over. It’s hardly some big conclusive scene about power level measuring. Besides, playing tug-of-war isn’t something that requires a lot of skill.

Again, from what I recall, Luke was lifting small rocks while standing on his hands as practice. We never see a scene where he has to lift something big besides the X-Wing - which, as an aside, proves definitively that telekinetic strength is not a matter of training. Otherwise Yoda wouldn’t have been disappointed when Luke failed to lift it because of his lack of belief.

And yeah, Luke had been practicing sensing using intuition, but his time with Yoda also proves he didn’t do much else with it.

I maintain that she’s never matched Kylo in a fair fight. She beat him once, when he was badly wounded and beating his chest to stay awake. And while Hux might be pathetic as a person, he’s still been the military commander they’ve been up against the whole trilogy so far.

As an aside, I’d argue Hux being pathetic as a person is rather intentional. History has shown pretty frequently that you don’t need an imposing dark lord to lead an empire. Look at Stalin - he’s often portrayed as very Snoke-like, but the man was apparently ridiculous.

Considering that it’s a novelization of the movie, yes. Also, from what I recall, the simulator offers settings for several different ships, meaning she’d have learned how to adjust to a new set of controls too. So yeah, I find it about as plausible as going from piloting an air speeder to a high-speed fighter ship.

His demotion isn’t irrelevant, though. On the contrary, it’s more important - he got demoted for pursuing a reckless plan against direct orders at the ultimate expense of the Resistance. He’s not an asset in this situation. The fact that he’s an excellent pilot doesn’t mean he’s a competent commander.

Which is, by the way, proven to be correct when he decides to go behind her back when he thinks he’s got a solution rather than bringing it to her attention. In fact, he explicitly keeps it a secret from her. The whole scene could have been resolved just as easily if he’d brought Finn up to the command center and had him explain what he knew.

Also, I may be misremembering, but from my understanding, he’s able to cause a mutiny by working with a small number of people who already have his back. He’s not storming the bridge with half the crew; the rank and file, aside from a couple of exceptions, go along with her plan without complaint, even when she orders evacuation. Nobody except for a handful of crew had a problem with her leadership.

See above. But also, I’m pretty certain the camera and shot angles were intentional. We start off on Poe’s side, but then in retrospect we’re supposed to ask why we were on his side. We bought into Poe the way Poe sees himself, but in retrospect he’s not the person he thinks he is. That perspective shift can be a little jarring, but the “aha” moment makes it good storytelling in my mind.

 

Why do you consistently ignore my point and refuse to debate that Admiral Purple Drank is a poor leader? Is it because you have no reply to it, or are you just going to keep repeating the idea that she did nothing wrong?

And, yes. The camera shots WERE intentional. I would hope so. My point in bringing them up is that they don't exactly paint her in a good light.

 

Like I said, see above. When the vast majority of the ship is going along with her orders without complaint, then it might be time to admit that it’s ridiculous to expect her to suffer fools. There’s more important things to worry about, like managing the staggered evacuation of multiple ships onto one, and ensuring they conserve fuel to get where they’re going.

My point in responding is that you weren’t meant to see her in a good light initially. You’re then meant to challenge that assumption, not cling to it. Same thing with DJ being set up as a Han Solo expy but turning out to be exactly the kind of scumbag you’d expect to find in a prison on Canto Bight.

 

In regular operation there would be an assumption of a plan existing in the crew. Poe getting told (basically) that he should just hope for the best without any plan is preposterous. It's entirely reasonable to think that she's baiting him, except that the bridge crew looks lost, and he manages to get a mutiny going without significant effort. When you're pressed for time and 100% busy, you don't go messing about with your ace pilot.

We see her in a bad light, as a bad commander, then the revelation comes and she's cast in a stupid, obstinant light. You get to that point and you see that the whole story with Poe, Finn, and Rose was a total waste of time that no lasting good came from.

 

No, he got told to get back to his post and follow orders. Their next interaction is when he discovers that she has a plan, and immediately dismisses it as cowardice and treason without even asking what she might be thinking.

And I’ve repeatedly stated my position on Poe as an asset versus a liability. You’re welcome to disagree, but as far as I’m concerned he’s not their ace pilot in this scene, he’s the guy who cost them their bomber fleet.

If you say so.

Now that’s just demonstrably false.

 

This is the general thread, so I'm dumping my thoughts on TFA vs TLJ here.

Premise: Fuck originality, TFA was a solid movie and I liked it.

Spoiler

TFA was not ambitious. The writers were clearly sticking to things they knew worked, and there were definitely traces of committee writing (Finn's wobbly character, mandatory jokes inserted between scenes). On the other hand the pacing was brisk enough I was never bored, the jokes had really good delivery, and I liked the way the characters bounced off one another. TFA never tried to pretend at grandeur, sometimes to the detriment of its emotionally impactful moments, and fully accepted it was a fun movie about space wizards.

As an intro to a guaranteed trilogy, it did its job by introducing characters I wanted to learn more about. And at the time I saw the mystery boxes as convenient fill in the blank spaces for future writers who wanted to expand the setting and otherwise didn't give a shit about them.

All fancy new force powers got a pass as TFA had a need to establish power levels for its saga in order to take full advantage of modern CGI.

Rey flipping the mind reading on Kylo is okay. Kylo Ren picked out specific images and memories to mock her with. Rey managed to bring up... the glaring insecurity and obsession that runs through his entire character, which is already incredibly evident from his garb and behavior. And probably did it through the connection he opened, doubt he bothered to set up defenses since he was used to breaking people with no ability to fight back.

Rey's ease in picking up the mind trick is slightly dicey, but otoh she tried it on someone who'd been brainwashed into service after being kidnapped as a child. The only character I can think of with less mental willpower than that would be a decraniated. Plus I don't think the mind trick scales with proficiency? It works if the target is weak willed, or it's completely worthless. If it's not going to solve any problems involving a named character, whatever.

And seriously, it was a stormtrooper. She probably could have escaped by enticing him to shoot so he'd miss and blow her shackles off.

IMO the final act with Starkiller base only falls on its face because it forced in one too many Death star parallels. Take out the shoehorned "X-wing must blow up for the some reason even more exposed reactor core" and the infiltration mission to rescue Rey and destroy the base from the inside is fresh enough for me.

Didn't care that Rey beat Kylo "giant hole in my stomach + mental breakdown from patricide" Ren. He trashed Finn and Rey was about to follow before she tapped into the Dark side to win, which he wanted her to do. Not necessarily the winning part, but Kylo successfully made Rey taste the power of the dark side. He won a victory by fundamentally shaping the way she learned to interact with the force (this is actually followed up on in TLJ with Luke pointing out Rey's lack of hesitation when reaching for the dark side). I did have a theory that he'd deliberately thrown the fight to further tempt her with the power trip, but was also fine with him just misjudging his own condition and her potential to draw on the dark side.

Not sure what people are even complaining about with Rey piloting the Faclon. The only questionably skillful driving is when she lines up Finn's shot at the end, which could easily have been fixed by having her pull straight up instead of doing a loop de loop. The rest of the time she constantly smashes into things and the entire ship is wobbling like a drunk UFO. That time she fixes something before Han is because she undid a modification he didn't know had been made. Not any superior insight into the falcon's workings.

I don't understand the complaints about the setup restricting paths for the sequels. The First Order came off not as a obvious Empire 2.0 but as a terrorist cell led by Empire weebs. It wasn't a massive crushing boot on the head of the galaxy, it was a small organization of fanatics with views so unpopular they had to resort to kidnapping children to get new recruits. The real threat was whoever supplied them with enough resources to build Starkiller. It was TLJ that went on to fully cement them as an Empire stand-in by retcon-ing them into a galaxy wide threat that could soak Starkiller with ease.

After they blew up the base I wasn't envisioning Empire v Rebels again, I was envisioning what kind of glorious kick in the ass Leia would give to the New Republic with her I TOLD YOU SO card. Obviously they needed to clean up any FO remnants, but if she kept up momentum maybe the New Republic would start an effort to bring the law to outer rim territories instead of resting on its laurels. The sequels could later revisit planets like Jakku and show improvement there to represent the peace and prosperity the New Republic could bring to the galaxy.

Or maybe Leia would wait for Rey to confirm Luke's location while helping the New Republic recover, then go park her entire fleet on his front door and ask for an explanation. Or maybe Luke hadn't given up on his nephew and that's why Kylo still felt the light calling to him. Or maybe Luke does start training Rey but instead of becoming his sole apprentice she's joining the surviving pupils of the New Jedi Order, training in isolation from any possible contact with Snoke after what happened with Ben. Or maybe... you get the idea.

TLJ had more original concepts in comparison to TFA, but I would strongly contest the idea that it was groundbreaking in comparison to most modern media. And its humor, pacing, and character interactions took a massive nosedive. The jokes made me cringe, the dialog and general interactions were clunky AF, and the execution for all those original ideas was so poorly thought out and presented it unsold me on the messages Johnson was trying to convey. It was the first star wars movie where I started looking at my watch halfway through.

And at the end of the day I came to see another Star Wars movie because I thoroughly enjoyed its spin on classic formulas. Johnson's attempted deconstructions of those formulas told me nothing interesting and ended up reducing my interest in continuing to follow the characters. It completely failed as the second movie in a trilogy, tearing down the things I liked from the first and building up nothing to be excited for in the third.

 

That shit gets reconned a lot.

 

Pulling this conversation out of the rants thread:

Firstly: not liking Rey is fine. She's not my favorite character either but the argument that she's a mary sue is totally baseless. She has plenty of flaws, screws up at least as often as she succeeds, and her strengths are counterbalanced by her weaknesses. I think she's a pretty well-rounded character but I prefer Finn in general.

So in regards to this argument, comparing Rey to Luke and Anakin is not something I normally do as a matter of course, it's an argument I have to adopt as part of arguing against people who do. All three protagonists are the protagonists of totally different stories and fill different roles in those stories. Anakin is the fallen paragon, Luke embodies the power of love and redemption, and Rey is the herald of the next generation. It's an apples and oranges argument and I don't see much point in it.

"The herald of the next generation" is what I'd say Rey's purpose in the new trilogy is, by the way: Disney reportedly wants to make Star Wars a franchise that will outlive the fans of the first movie. It's going to be around forever, and I don't think Rey is going to be the main character beyond episode nine or so when there's so much more universe to explore by having a different protagonist for each trilogy. Rey's purpose, I think, isn't to fall into darkness and doom the galaxy or to be the great redeemer of Kylo Ren; it's to be the heroine who opens up the universe, recreates either the Jedi Order or something new to replace it, and pave the way for the heroes of many future stories. We see this in her origins in TLJ: you don't need to be someone special or related to someone special to be the protagonist of a Star Wars movie anymore, and that means new heroes can come from any walk of life and any corner of the galaxy, not just the ones that have some connection to the Skywalkers.

Also, Rey being "objectively worse" than her predecessors is an oversimplification, if not grossly inaccurate. She faces different challenges and handles them in different ways than Luke and Anakin do. Neither of them had to deal with a lightsaber duel against an experienced (if also severely wounded) opponent in their first go-around in the hero business, but on the other hand Rey didn't need to fly a snubfighter down a Death Star trench or dogfight with droid fighters in her first outing either. Her piloting experience all appears to be in flying freighters, which seems to be a pretty different skill set.

I absolutely cannot agree that TFA is in any way redundant or superfluous, but before I get into why I think it's important to establish some context. Disney was never ever going to open the new franchise with a completely original Star Wars film, not after the prequels left such a bad taste in everyone's mouths. Their first outing was all about proving they had the chops to handle a beloved franchise and recapture the magic of the original trilogy, and that means leaning on the nostalgia factor a lot. I think they succeeded at this but also made something very distinct.

For starters, I don't experience the same emotions watching TFA as I do when watching A New Hope, and that in and of itself makes it a unique experience. Ben's death never really affected me much for instance while Han's death tore a gaping hole out of the part of my heart where my childhood lives. TFA is similar to ANH narratively, yes, but the emotional context of its scenes and plot elements are all totally flipped around.

Take Starkiller Base for instance. At first glance it looks like a ripoff of the Death Star but consider what the Death Star symbolized in A New Hope: it was the manifestation of the iron fist of the Empire, a symbol of their uncontested control over the whole galaxy, that they had such power that they could destroy planets with impunity and have no fear of revolt or retaliation, and its destruction is the titular new hope for the galaxy. But in TFA the Empire has been defeated and there's a new evil on the block. Starkiller Base's purpose is to emphasize that the bad guys are back and they're just as dangerous as the Empire used to be even if they aren't the dominant power in the universe just yet. We also find out about the Death Star much earlier on than we do Starkiller Base; its existence is played as a horrifying reveal that the bad guys aren't just some small-time Imperial remnants. And while there is an equivalent to the trench run scene, the destruction of Starkiller Base is not the ultimate victory of the movie in TFA the way it is in ANH; that honor goes to Rey finally tracking down Luke.

Let's do another one. How about the cantina scene? Nope, that's totally different too. In ANH the cantina scene happens in the first act when the heroes are still getting their shit together. We meet some new characters, we learn some new information about Ben (namely that he's a badass who isn't afraid to hack a guy's arm off when necessary), and we leave the scene on a high note with the heroes escaping the stormtroopers and embarking on their quest. But the same scene in TFA happens in the middle of the movie during a low point. The heroes are tested, split up, and ultimately defeated and the story ends on its lowest note with the capture of Rey and the reveal of Starkiller Base.

So yeah, that's my feelings on TFA. It's a successful homage that pays respect to what came before it without copying it word for word.

 

So has anyone seen Solo? I've heard that its actually decent rather than the shitshow that was expected considering its troubled production.

 

Not yet, but the most encouraging news I've heard about it is that Ford apparently loved the new kid's take on his character. The fact that some untested newbie was slated to fill the biggest shoes in cinema history was my single biggest concern about the movie, so I'll be giving it a watch this weekend.

 

You remember James Cameron came out with a glowing review of Terminator Genisys?

You remember what an execrable pile of garbage that movie was?

Also, even without that, I don't really care what Ford thinks of... well, anything Star Wars related. The man has wanted nothing to do with the franchise ever since Empire (IIRC) and doesn't seem to have much love for the role.

 

No on both counts, I don't follow the Terminator series.

That's great but why are you saying it to me?

 

Well, Cameron did and it was.

Because basing your expectations on a role's quality on the word of a man who has wanted to put as much distance between himself and that role is kinda daffy?

 

Probably, but I don't have that opinion of Ford or his relationship with the character.

 

So I saw it and thought it was decent. Not great but good enough that I didn't feel like I wasted my time. Though I admit that Han Solo didn't really feel like Han Solo. Anyway I'm really curious as too what the original version was like before Ron Howard came in.