It is a sad thing when one must tear apart something they love. Star Wars has been a foundationally life experience for millions and millions of people across the last few generations. It has gone from cinematic masterpieces, to CGI saturated critical failures and everything in between. The prequels were initially well received before eventually the realisation of their short comings became unavoidable. Not to say they are devoid of any positive qualities, simply that their writing and presentation leave a great deal to be desired. Nevertheless, the fanbase absorbed the beleaguered Prequels in to the canon with some opting to pretend they’re unrelated to the Original Trilogy. One thing that can be said about the prequels with the benefit of hindsight and the new entries is that, even at their dumbest, they still felt like Star Wars. Most of the time they didn’t look like Star Wars but the feel of the world, characters and designs evoked some of that Star Wars feel. J.J. Abrams did manage to evoke some of that look as well in Force Awakens by reverting to practical effects and sticking very close to the formula of A New Hope. It often managed to achieve the look, though not always the feeling. Rogue One took the series in an interesting direction, focusing on non-Jedi related stories of the rebellion fighting the Empire. Despite heavy re-shoots and Kathleen Kennedy falling out with Director Gareth Edwards, the film managed to be a serviceable adventure. Not to mention giving us one of the best Darth Vader scenes of any film or show to date. Last Jedi was supposed to pick up the threads laid so carefully out by J.J. and show that Disney Star Wars wouldn’t just be copy and pasting ideas from the past films. Fans wanted a new Empire Strikes Back, wanted to revel in the return of their hero Luke Skywalker and wanted to feel Star Wars again. Sadly, Kathleen Kennedy opted to team with writer/director Rian Johnson to produce something entirely unexpected. Kennedy allowed Johnson to act unilaterally without regard for previous films or those that will follow. He was permitted to make what is, in essence, a generic sci-fi action film dressed in a Star Wars blanket. Worse still, Johnson seemed to be aggrieved that he had to deal with anything Star Wars related – seeing the franchise he is supposed to be promoting and building as an anchor holding him back as he was more concerned with heavy handed contemporary political messaging. Johnson managed to somehow lose most of the goodwill fans had towards the franchise. How, you ask? Read on dear reader, if your heart is steeled enough….

It would seem the best way to tackle the issues within Last Jedi by going through it in chronological order. This should help illustrate how each mistake would almost always be compounded by later events and that much of what happens seems to be written on the fly. Much of the structure and dialogue comes across as a first draft, an unrefined story with the potential foundation to be something good after a few more re-writes.

 

Before we begin, yes, the humour is most definitely a distraction 95% of the time. Its inclusion seems more a cynical, corporate decision by executives pointing at Marvel’s success and wanting to copy it. As such, little time will be given to pointing out every failed attempt at comedy and instead more on narrative failings, inconsistent or illogical character writing and tonal short falls.

Let’s just jump right in to this…

 

Following the opening crawl, we pick up with our Rebels (here the Resistance repeatedly are called and identify as Rebels, so Rebels they shall be) fleeing their base that Starkiller Base was lining up to destroy at Awakens finale when the First Order arrives. As is the case with Hollywood these days, believing ‘Bigger Is Better’ the Order unveils a new, super huge “Fleet Killer” cruiser – The Dreadnought. Poe Dameron approaches in a lone X-Wing citing that his ship is too small to be targeted by the monstrous ship which is the first thing that undermines our villains.

 

Permit me a brief tangent, but in professional wrestling there exists a notion that you should not only strive to make yourself look amazing but also your opponent. If you make belittle your opponent’s ability, skill or what not, making the audience think that your opponent isn’t worth taking seriously, then what do you gain by beating them? And where do they go afterwards, if nobody takes them seriously? You should make your opponent intimidating, dangerous or at the bare minimum a capable fighter to make your victory (or defeat) more believable or impressive.

 

In the first exchanged between the Order and Rebels, the Order is made to look ridiculous. Firstly, having been fighting Rebels for however many decades now, are we to believe that the Order never thought to install cannons to deal with X-Wings? Okay, they rely on TIE Fighters, but surely if you can build a planet sized cannon you can make a car sized cannon. Fine, its an oversight due to their vast numbers. Next comes Poe contacting General Hux in which the first comedy bit blazes in with Poe pulling the old “Can you hear me? I’m holding for person ‘x’.” with an actual “your mother joke” thrown in there as if its 1990. Okay, Poe’s smartarseness was established in Awakens but General Hux keeps responding to him, embarrassingly, rather than just blowing his little ship to a million pieces or resuming fire on the Rebel Fleet. Due to Hux engaging with Poe in this exchange, Poe manages to destroy the surface cannons to allow his bombers to enter the fray. Following the Rebel escape, Snoke appears via hologram only to slam Hux to the ground, drag him round and embarrass him before his bridge crew. Nothing in this opening made the Order seem imposing beyond one huge ship that is disposed of easily, so why would we fear for our Rebels against a foe so incompetent?

 

This skirmish also had some of the most glaring ignorance to physics in space, beginning the films habit of overlooking of the details that sell a films world to an audience. The Rebel’s take down the Dreadnought using new Bombers that, much like WW2 bombers physically drop bombs down on the ship. In space. The ships open a hatch, and then a mystery force pulls the bombs down to the Dreadnought. Okay, maybe the bombs are magnetic, but the film never tells you that, not even in a throwaway line like “magnets armed, bombs away” or anything. It also poses questions regarding the shields on ships and whether or not they can hold air in or not that is also never addressed. This is a recurring motif of the film to present you with something contrary to what has been established without explaining as to why it is. Further ignorance of the effects of space is in the ensuing chase between the Order and the Rebels – the Order cannot close the gap but continue the bombardment. Seems straight forward enough but for whatever reason the Star Destroyers are Arcing their shots at the Rebel ships. Again, another tiny detail but in space you could throw a golf ball in a straight line and it would just keep going. Firing lasers works the same way, they should just fire straight at the ships but instead Johnson adds an arc as if compensating for a gravitational pull that isn’t there. Even further, and perhaps the thing that undercuts the logic of the chase is the idea that Order couldn’t send a single Stardestroyer ahead of the Rebels at lightspeed to block their escape plan, placing them in a pincer of laser fire and TIE fighters. And what was wrong with the Y-Wing Bombers? There is also the issue of Leia ordering Poe to withdraw, only to then have every other ship also ignore Leia. If Leia is really the general Awakens told us, her soldiers should obey without hesitiation. It’s believable that Poe could go Rogue but that every other vessel would hear their General issue an order and choose to go against it, is not.

In the opening scene then, Last Jedi makes fools of the villains turning them in to the butt of several lazy jokes, shows them as tactically, technically inept, fails to accurately create a sense of being in space and glaring, basic leaps in logic that cause a disconnect in the mind of the viewer. These may seem like small errors, but they continually distract you from immersion causing you to notice the next one.

After the Dreadnaught is destroyed by a last gap bomber, the Rebel fleet jumps away at lightspeed. Having disobeyed Leia’s orders to not engage the dreadnaught, Poe gets grilled and seemingly demotes him. It’s possible that she was being dramatic with him given the close nature of their relationship and his unopposed command of the fleet but unfortunately this demotion becomes the linchpin for a later narrative failing. The rebel fleet soon discovers that the Order has changed the game by tracking them through Hyperspace – how you ask? A bug like in Empire? Or perhaps a traitor aboard the Rebel Cruiser leaking information? Nothing so interesting – simply a non-specific piece of technology with a set of non-specific operations. This is another of Johnson’s narrative choices that make it feel like a first draft script rather than a re-drafted, honed piece of writing. Here’s how the new tech works – the Order has a device that is on only one of their main ships and is only tracking one of the Rebel ships at any time. A competent military force with this piece of technology would have it implemented across the fleet, creating a web to track the target. Instead, given that such implementation would break the Star Wars universe, Johnson must create a convoluted logic hole to permit his story to happen. If this was a small part of the film’s story then it would be easier to ignore but the whole film revolves around this contrived chase. It leads to Poe’s horrible story and the worse Canto Bight story with Finn. Finn’s story comes across as though and entire script was written by Johnson, but he forgot about the character entirely, so tacked on a side story to include him. His presence, unlike in Awakens, makes no difference to the overall narrative, (with one exception) leads to no positive changes in his or anyone else’s character and worst off all – he is the secondary character in his own story. We’ll get to that though. We first see Finn waking up from his medical coma following his spinal split at the hands of Kylo Ren. Stumbling in to Poe as no doctor was available attend one of their only patients, he enquires about Rey.

 

From here, we finally cut to what everybody came to watch Last Jedi for – the return of Luke Skywalker. In the Original Trilogy we followed Luke from whining teenage farm boy to Jedi Knight and Saviour of the Galaxy. His optimism was unparalleled, believing so strongly in the good in people that he fought to redeem the second most evil person in the galaxy, Darth Vader, at great peril to himself and others. He inspired greatness in those around him, standing as a beacon of virtue and a paragon of hope in a galaxy shrouded in darkness. His wordless cameo at the conclusion of Awakens was much less than what people wanted, and for two years people wondered how Luke came to be in exile and how he would react to being reunited with his family lightsabre that he last saw falling down a vast expanse in the belly of Cloud City, still clutched in the hand lopped off moments earlier by Vader. How did Rian Johnson choose to manifest this moment? Luke in a perplexed stupor, convinced it a trick? Expectant of Rey and his lightsabre due to his Force power? No, nothing so interesting. Once Rey hands him his long-lost lightsabre, Luke looks at it momentarily before comically throwing it over his shoulder, off a cliff and walking off in silence. If this moment seems like something that Luke Skywalker would never do, then get comfy because this is merely the beginning of the vandalization of the character of Luke Skywalker.

 

Johnson’s interpretation of the cultural icon beggar’s belief at times, clearly having no interest in using Luke for anything more than obligation to further push Rey. Following his storming away from Rey, he goes back to a cabin and locks himself in before and old furry friend breaks down the door. Chewbacca’s arrival does bring Luke to ask about where Han is and again Johnson shows his failure to understand the franchise by not showing Luke hearing how his best friend died at the hands of his own son due to Luke’s mystery failure. Also, for some reason, Rey translates Chewbacca for Luke, as though the two had never met. Given how little time was spent on the aftermath of Han Solo’s death, here was a perfect moment to give it some weight and give Luke the impetus to take on Kylo Ren. Instead, nothing. We cut to Kylo Ren as a visual editing answer to Luke’s question, but we’ll come to him in a moment. Luke’s exile, we later learn, is the result of his extreme response to feeling the dark side in Ben Solo one night, 10-15 years ago. Johnson tries to dress it up in a Rashomon style “how did it really happen?” frame, showing us 3 different versions of the event but the bones of it are – Ben was being vaguely filled with the dark side, Luke looked in to his mind one night, in a moment of madness Luke ignites his lightsabre to kill his own Nephew before his brain kicked back in, Ben is woken by the lightsabre and seeing how his master/uncle was going to murder him pulls down the school, kills some students and leads away others – (The Knights of Ren story that Johnson also cast aside).

 

Rian Johnson tries to present it as a singular moment of weakness but the idea that the man who redeemed the actually evil Darth Vader would jump right to executing a sleeping child for their potential evil is beyond nonsensical. Further, not only did Luke have this moment of madness, he never tried to fix the mess he made. Having provoked Ben, the son of his sister and best friend, to go full black-hat - Luke just leaves. By all accounts on screen in the 2 films, he did something to R2-D2 that made him sleep until exactly when he needed to wake up (another dropped thread from Awakens) and just checked out for a decade or two. His exile wasn’t a temporary “when you need me I will return” but a dog wandering in to the woods to die alone. In the Force Awakens, Han says of Luke’s disappearance “People who knew him best think he went looking for the first Jedi temple” implying that he had told the people who knew him – Leia and Han – where he was going. As it turns out, yes, he had gone looking for it but the why is never answered. Luke leaves just after unleashing an angry Kylo Ren shaped villain upon the galaxy, whom he knows has a connection to an even more powerful evil and Luke sees this and thinks “well, now I need to try Jedi Archaeology, bye guys, hope things work out with your son”? Presumably, the intention in Force Awakens was that Luke was trying to Master his understanding of the Force to one day undo his mistake or gain certain wisdom that could help. In Last Jedi it is revealed Luke was running away to die, begging the question of why all the palaver of ancient Jedi Temples, texts, R2-D2 and maps? Again, more issues that bring in to question the integrity of the universe, breaking immersion. Instead of engaging with what Johnson wants you to, he leaves you pointing at Awakens saying “Okay but what about this?” to which his answer invariably is that it doesn’t matter.

This is the main, agonising issue with Johnsons presentation in that he never even had a conversation with J.J. Abrams about where he positioned the universe to go. Instead, he operates as if he never watched Awakens, almost guessing what the characters were like. Fingers can be pointed at fan communities for over analysing ever word, generating “fan theories” and the like, but when the first film in a trilogy lays down distinct story threads (The Knights of Ren, Snoke, the Myster-Rey (sorry), Luke’s leaving, R2’s nap, the reappearance of Anakin’s lightsabre, how the Order emerged etc) only to have the next one vehemently opposed to continuing those threads, the fans are not to blame for being disenchanted.  Johnson’s defence of there not being enough room in the film for those threads is asinine as he wrote the damn thing. Had he the inclination to actually continue the established universe rather than pretend like he had never heard of it, he could of. Johnson paid so little attention to sewing his film in to the pre-existing universe that the audience has to keep writing his film for him in their heads to compensate.

 

As we cut away to Kylo during the returning Luke, he is immediately subjugated and embarrassed by Snoke in a more personal manner than Hux. In Awakens Kylo’s look and mask were his attempt at emulating his grandfather, Vader, as well as being something intimidating. Audiences seemed to agree that the look was at least cool so, naturally, Johnson has Snoke describe it as “ridiculous” before Kylo smashes it in a rage. More evidence that Johnson was actively undermining what audiences appreciated in the first instalment and expected from the new trilogy. Snoke tells Kylo of the tracker aboard the Raddus and to go eliminate the last of the Rebel fleet.

To recap the opening 30 or so minutes, Johnson makes the Order goofballs instead of threatening, failed with basic physics, inserts off beat and lazy jokes and took one of cinemas most optimistic and beloved heroes and turned him in to a nearly child killing coward who ran from a problem he created. He also managed to remove one of the cooler designed characters distinguishing features while belittling their evilness. And now we get to the bad parts of the narrative – Canto Bight, Rose and Holdo.

 

God, this side of the storyline is arguably one of the most poorly thought out, poorly written, blatantly propagandist and overall unengaging narratives ever put to pixels. The Order catches up to the Rebel fleet, thanks to that world breaking tracking device, launching an attack on the unprepared ships. Miraculously, Rebel command immediately guess that the Order must be able to track them through Hyperspace (despite it never being a problem before) and resort to moving as fast as non-hyper speed will take them. This creates the main plot device in the film – the idea being that the rebel ships can move fast enough to be out of range of the remaining Order ships but not fast enough to actually escape. During the initial onslaught, the rebels suffer a huge loss when another poorly written decision results in TIE fighters blowing up the bridge. When attacked, the rebel ship increases power to rear shields, which Johnson then liberally interprets to mean that only the rear shields now work. With that, Kylo Ren somehow enters the cruiser’s X-Wing bay, obliterating any chance of response the rebels had. Unopposed he then lines up a shot to destroy the ships bridge and rebel command with it. He and Leia seem to share a moment through the force, highlighting doubt in Kylo but as he finally concedes to his better angels, removing his thumb from the trigger, his wingmen step in to fire the shots – launching Leia, Akbar and more to the cold void of space. So comes to pass the final role of Carrie Fisher, striking an odd emotional chord as the character that defined her career passes shortly after – oh, wait, Leia survives being blown in to the cold vacuum of space.

 

This decision plays oddly in more than one way – firstly, in knowing that Carrie Fisher had actually passed away a year before release, having Leia also be lost would have been a fitting, emotional moment in the film. Johnson instead has her survive the impossible, living in to the next film without Carrie Fisher to reprise the role. Logically, taking Leia off the board was the obvious move but the issue will now need resolving in episode 9, presumably killing Leia off screen. It will deprive the audience of a cathartic moment saying goodbye to Leia and Fisher. Another odd decision by Johnson. The next issue is the manner of her survival – having been blown in to space, Leia hangs there before twitching her hand, opening her eyes and using the force to fly in to the blown-out section. Johnson tries to create a beautiful moment but whether it’s the greenscreen or lighting is unclear, but it looks bad. Leia’s movement was unnatural, looking like a low-rent Superman or Mary Poppins. This is not to mention how, given the high-speed pursuit the cruiser was in when she was blown out, Leia was still right next to the ship. Leia should have been closer the Order ships than her own given the gap in her being ejected and her flying back in. Further, when she reaches the ships airlock, Poe simply opens it for her which does not result in every member of the crew in that section also being expelled in to space. Yet more failures to either understand and convey a sense of being in space or a failure to explain why these things can happen now. There may well be some new rules regarding the shielding in play that contain the atmosphere, but Johnson went to great lengths to tell us there was only shielding on the rear of the ship, regardless of those rules or not.

 

In the midst of Leia being returned to the ship, she drops a small device – a McGuffin that allows Rey to find Leia across space – which is picked up by Finn. Seemingly forgotten from the main plot, Finn is given a side mission that impacts the main story as much as the Porgs do. Realising that if Rey returned now she would likely be attacked by the Order, Finn decides to try to flee the chase to divert Rey from the conflict. Perhaps given Johnson’s lack of interest in Finn, his character is probably the most consistent with his Awakens portrayal. Previously, Finn had run away from the Order, then at first opportunity, was going to run away to the Outer Rim after meeting with Maz Kanada. As in Awakens it is his need to help Rey that makes him act heroically, even if in this instance he is running from the fight to save her. At the escape pods Finn encounters one of the top three problems with Last Jedi – the introduction of Rose. Rose is the sister of the Dreadnaught destroying bomber who managed to launch her last-second bombs and has taken it upon herself to taser anyone who tries to flee, which now includes Finn. What follows is set up for the films lowest subplot and it is rife with narrative contradictions, logical failings and character irregularities. The plan, as it is laid out, requires Finn and Rose to take a ship to a nearby planet to find a hacker, return to the fleet, sneak aboard the Order’s flagship, disable the tracking device, sneak back off to the rebel fleet and then jump away.

Strangely, given that Snoke had been unknown to the rebels in Awakens, they now possess a detailed schematic of his ship, which also includes the previously unknown Hyperspace tracking device. Further, Finn claims to have mopped the floors in the tracking devices room begging several questions, most pressing being with all this information, why was the hyperspace tracking a surprise? If Finn had mopped the floors in the tracker room, why did he declare the notion of Hyperspace Tracking as “impossible” earlier? They do immediately guess that it was hyperspace tracking that the Order was using but with a schematic and Finn they should have been prepared to deal with it, surely. Further, why was Snoke unknown if they have scans of his ship? Additionally, if Finn and Rose can simply jump aboard a smaller ship and escape undetected, why don’t they simply shuttle people off the cruiser to safety? We know the rebels only number in the hundreds, so over a few hours (their fuel is said to last 18 hours) they could easily evacuate everybody. Finally, in Star Wars lore there has already been a display of tracking ships through Hyperspace – in A New Hope Han Solo and Leia escape the Imperial Fleet only for Leia to say that they must being tracked via a device on the Falcon. Why not simply have a tracker attached during the initial skirmish? Or perhaps aboard with a potential traitor? It would seem that Johnson was too focused on forcing his chase scenario in to existence to worry about the internal and universal consistency of his set up.

 

Poe is onboard with the plan but really, based on the duo’s chemistry in Awakens, an away mission for two people should have been Poe and Finn. The two provided some of the better moments between characters in the first outing, showing a real bond in only two scenes that would have been well served being fleshed out here. Instead, Poe remains aboard to serve as a whipping boy to another new character, and second biggest problem – Vice Admiral Holdo. After Leia returns to the ship, she finds herself in a coma unable to continue command, resulting in Holdo taking charge. Holdo is off putting from the start, not dressed in any kind of attire one would expect of a Vice Admiral, wearing a kind of ball gown, has purple hair and a halo-style tiara. Her first action is to withhold information from Poe because he is a “trigger happy fly boy”, which then causes Poe to actively work against her for the sake of the fleet. If you believe one of your subordinates is liable to act out when up against a wall, putting him up against a wall is only going to go one way. Horrible writing for an awful character. Potentially, there could have been an interesting story here with Holdo and Leia suspecting a traitor aboard requiring the tight lid on the plan. Perhaps, Holdo is the traitor which is why she slowly funnelled all the remaining rebels aboard a single ship before sending them out, defenceless, in escape pods and why she remained aboard alone, as well as her refusal to wear rebel attire. Instead, we get her being belligerent and condescending towards one of our (supposed) new generation of heroes. She suffers no comeuppance for her horrible decisions and is later lauded as a great hero for them. But we’ll get to that when we get to that.  In the meantime, Finn and Rose take us to a blackhole, narratively speaking.

 

Poor John Boyega, going from joint lead in the first outing is relegated to a reactionary soundboard, as second fiddle to an unknown, random character. Boyega does his level best to bring something to Finn, still finding one or two moments to charm but is unfortunately left in the dust as Johnson focuses on the new character. Rose is given the dominant role of the two, making all the decisions as well as having all the character moments. In keeping with the plan, they head to a planet that will likely live in infamy along with most of the Prequels called Canto Bight. In concept the idea is not a bad one, usually in Star Wars we follow characters through the seedier underbelly of the galaxy (see Han Solo), going to dimly cantina’s full of criminals hiding from the empire or other outlaws. Canto Bight is instead a casino style planet, filled to the brim with the most upper crust of upper crusts – who also happen to be criminals or war profiteers. There was an opportunity to contrast with the usual Star Wars ruffians and their chosen locale, which Johnson half-heartedly attempts showing the glitz of the rich, drinking their champagne while dressed like cast offs from the Hunger Games capital citizens. Again, Johnson never goes deeper than the surface level with this, homing in on a story with Finn, but mostly Rose, seeking to release racing horse/dogs in to the wild. Having simply crashed their ship on a beach, in the open, the two are arrested before being placed in a jail, preventing them from meeting the hacker they needed. In a show of first draft writing going unaltered, pure chance places Finn and Rose in jail with “DJ” (Benicio Del Toro) who just happens to be an excellent hacker also. DJ immediately uses a small device to free them from prison (if he could have left any time, why did he wait?) before splitting off with BB-8. Finn and Rose’s escape route takes them through the stables, meeting the horse/dogs and the child slaves that maintain them. Rose is given several moments to fill in her backstory about being held in a place like this, working for people with conflicting morals. If only some other character in this plot had been a slave to a morally questionable overlord, forcing them to do things against their will. Imagine, if you can, a stormtrooper, horrified by his first “combat” being a massacre and running away – oh, yeah, Finn is here and is a character the audience are already attached to.

 

Had this been a buddy trip with Poe and Finn, the character moments that ring hollow or are plain uninteresting could have been, deservedly, given to Finn – sharing with Poe what his life in servitude was like, why he hates the Order now and why providing a momentary victory to the slaves on Canto Bight mattered so much. Instead, Johnson barely acknowledges the slaves choosing to show that animal cruelty is the real evil on Canto Bight. Rose, again not Finn, persuades the children to let them take the animals by flashing her latest Star Wars Merchandise – a ring that (in another odd similarity to the Hunger Games) looks ordinary but has a Secret Rebel Symbol within. Rose highlights the wounds on the horse/dogs from being whipped, making her (again not Finn) resolute in her decision to ride the horse/dogs to freedom with them, resulting in a waste of time “chase scene”. Given that the mission the two are on is highly time sensitive, with lives potentially lost every minute they take, engaging in a stampede rather than directly escaping is baffling. Nevertheless, the two crash through the casino from earlier, upturning tables, smashing walls and windows, causing some low-level chaos within it before heading to the beach for their illegally parked ship. Given the pairs backstories, one a First Order janitor and the other allegedly from a similar slave running planet, the notion that this destruction will only result in the slaves being dragged up to fix everything never occurs to them. Despite their wooping and hollering the true rich, ruling class will be barely even notice the damage. They may, in fact, be incensed by the incident resulting harsher treatment of said child slaves. (As a quick aside, why child slaves? On one of the galaxy’s richest planets, they don’t have top of the line droids capable of the same work as a child?)

 

With the Canto Bight security craft closing in, Rose and Finn break off from the pack, hiding in the long grass and the dark of the night. Rose then delivers only her second most cringeworthy line in the film – looking at the freed horse/dogs on the hill, enjoying the grass for probably the first time in their lives, Finn expresses how the escape and its destruction is worth it, to make the rich people hurt, in of itself a terrible motivation. Rose, then pulls the saddle off their trusted steed, smiles and says, “Now it’s worth it”. So, in Johnsons narrative, the cute creatures are positioned higher in value than that of the child slaves that Rose made no attempt to rescue or help beyond some words. Not to mention the high likelihood they will be immediately recaptured given the security already right on top of them. Finn’s character is also undermined here by taking out some kind of revenge against this city, assuming that everybody, down to the last janitor and bartender, is inherently evil. Having been a nameless slave for the Order, he would surely be able to appreciate the shades of grey involved. Knowing that there are regular people living there, as well as not actually knowing anything about anybody there, he still paints them all as evil due to their association with “Capitalism”. To have a film preaching about the evil of capitalism is one thing. To have a Disney film, particularly a Star Wars film they paid over $4 BILLION to own is aggressively hypocritical. This is shortly after focused on to simply “War Profiteering” once the pair are rescued by DJ and BB-8 and head back to the fleet.

 

DJ and BB-8 clearly managed to escape without the need for rampant destruction, even securing a superior ship for escape. This highlights how even more unnecessary the prior chase scene was as, like this whole plot, it accomplished nothing resembling useful. Finn becomes outraged that DJ stole their current ship from one of those rich people whom he had been trampling only minutes ago (more inconsistency) which prompts DJ to reveal that the owner had been selling arms to the First Order and the Resistance. This is meant to be some deep reveal, that really the war that has been waging since Episode 1 is all because of these filthy, weapon manufacturing, warmongers. Except, until 20-30 years ago, the Emperor had been manipulating the raising of those armies and then maintained his Empire through fear by creating more and more soldiers and weapons. With that, it is not unreasonable that the New Republic would have been keeping forces in reserve should such an army rise again. Which it did, with Snoke acquiring new ships, weapons and soldiers before annihilating the entire system containing the New Republic in Awakens. But no, it’s just the opportunists who make the ships and guns for profit that are the problem, not the ones ordering and using them to kill people. Johnson seems to have put emotion before logic yet again. Does any of that Canto Bight side story sound like it belongs in a Star Wars film? Modern political propaganda is not something that audiences respond to, let alone in a fantasy, space-opera like Star Wars is supposed to be and most definitely does not feel like Star Wars. This whole story line is evidence of Johnson showing more interest in inserting a contemporary political message at the sake of narrative cohesion, and its lack of subtly serves as further evidence of an underdeveloped script.

 

While these events were playing out the film did intersperse scenes from the other plot threads, firstly with resuming the not-training of Rey by Luke. How Johnson manages to so drastically drop the ball with Luke Skywalker as a Jedi Mentor can only be by design. Sulking around his damp island, ignoring Rey and engaging in some truly odd actions, this hermit resembles nothing of the original Luke Skywalker. Much of this island section feels like time filling, almost as if Johnson didn’t know what to do so opted to do the writing equivalent of nothing. Rey follows Luke on his daily calorie search which includes the most convoluted fishing routine – first he pole-vaults across a cliff on a several hundred-meter-long stick, secures his footing in the opposite cliff face before lifting the huge stick with his hands and skewering a fish below. The base of the pole never moves, he could have done it without the vaulting at all. He also approaches what can only be described as cow/manatee hybrid, sunning itself on a cliff edge, forcibly milks its sort-of-udder and drinks it fresh before grimacing at Rey with the green milk dribbling down his beard. What significance does this play in the story or to the audience? This is what Rian Johnson reduced the once legendary hero to, a grumpy, ignorant hermit with manatee milk dripping down his face. Luke’s appearance at the end of Awakens was a moment that excited the entire Star Wars fanbase, a chance to see their hero return in all his glory, surely more powerful and wise than we last saw him, to join with the new generation against Snoke and Ren. Instead, this. Yet again, Johnson leaves the audience begging as to why. Why, with all the innumerable potential stories you could tell of Luke Skywalker hearing the call to arms and to train a new apprentice, did you choose this version? Why is he so catastrophically effected by the Ben Solo incident as to refuse to help? Why is he living in this miserable existence, waiting to die? (If we’re honest, most of those cliffs look high enough to do the job if he was truly committed to the notion.) Why does he say that he deliberately came to the “most unfindable place in the galaxy” to avoid being found, yet left a map with R2-D2? The assumption was, for many, that Luke felt the disturbance in the Force of either the use of Starkiller base or Han Solo dying, leading him to release R2-D2 from his slumber to return to the fray. Worse, is the waste of Mark Hamill the man and actor. He does he level best to bring this version of Luke to life but to take five minutes to watch any interview with the man and to dispense of his fun loving, happy nature for this sulking, one note writing can only be seen as wasteful. To call Johnson’s choices disappointing would be far too generous.

 

Something interesting does threaten to happen at one stage, with Rey being called to a tree by the force which contains the ancient Jedi Texts. The design of the tree temple and the texts were both very good it is simply that nothing truly develops around these interesting things. Luke does share a moment with Rey when he finally talks to her about her history that contains one of the better jokes about Rey being “from pretty much nowhere”. Luke reveals that the reason he is refusing to train or help her is that he believes that Jedi have to come to an end. That is a huge development in both the story and character of Luke Skywalker that is void of explanation, simply having the Jedi stop being a thing would surely be counterproductive as the Sith are not going to simply stop because the Jedi are gone. Likely it would lead to Sith dominating the Galaxy yet again. Luke describes the notion that the Jedi are the only good way of wielding of the force as “vanity”, which would be an interesting direction to take things. The force exists, responding to the manipulations of whomever has the skill to achieve any goal, morally good or evil. It has no bias, no explicit preference in its use (that we know of). Given both Rey and Kylo are operating in the grey area of the Force, unwilling to commit whole heartedly to one or the other, there could have been a focused theme around this.

 

Luke does agree to teach Rey after he has a scene with an old friend aboard the Millennium Falcon. This short scene with Luke and R2 is the only scene in which it can be said that Luke Skywalker made a brief cameo. When Luke sits down and R2 comes beeping out the shadows, Hamill’s face lights up, his voice becomes softer as he exclaims the droids name. Even R2 using the hologram of Leia from A New Hope is done almost perfectly. Sadly, it lasts merely seconds before he returns to the hermit character to tell Rey he will teach her three lessons that will help her see his view of ending the Jedi. Before they begin Johnson introduces his second new use of the force in the form of trans-galactic communication between Rey and Kylo Ren. Seemingly trying to establish some extra personal stakes to their relationship, Johnson has them communicate through the force.

 

Having Force users able to connect their minds across space is not entirely unrealistic within the confines of Star Wars before now, with their ability to sense each other and more from great distances. Traditionally, it has been enormous incidents (Aldaraan and Order 66) or close proximity (Obi-Wan in New Hope or Luke later). It was shown as well that Luke and Leia were able to communicate at close distances in some capacity, but nothing before comes close to what Johnson introduced. His direction of the scenes is also poor in he never establishes the physical space they communicate in, not showing the two in the same shot until the fourth time they communicate, which means the two never feel connected. Despite best efforts there is also more than one occasion in which their eyelines don’t seem to match up with their vague spatial positioning. The decision to have them communicate in this manner feels very lazy, as though Johnson could think of no other way to create tension between the two than literally having them tell each other their motivations. If Rey had been learning from Luke that the force is ubiquitous, unprejudicial and that it was the institutions like the Jedi Order, The Empire and First Order trying to control it that is the problem, her late desire to talk to Ren would have made more sense. Instead of trying to turn him to the light, she could simply want to free him from his master. Combined with Kylo’s doubt, lacking the courage of his dictated convictions, the two could have joined to form something new entirely. The most grievous sin of the scene is that Rey and Kylo discuss the death of Han Solo which upsets Rey, who turns around to see Luke Skywalker, a man who only just heard of his death, who is completely fine. Rey, who took one short flight on the Falcon and spent about half an hour with Han Solo on Starkiller base is in mourning for him, but his best friend of 30 years is continuing on as though he never even knew him. This isn’t later used as Luke avoiding his pain before emotionally capitulating to grief, he never even talks about it.

 

Luke’s unaffected nature continues during the start of training, joking with Rey about raising her arm when he told her to “reach out” before becoming very serious again with Rey instantly being drawn in to the dark side (or at least, an area on the island strong with the dark side). Luke is dismayed by her, as it reminds him of what Ben Solo was like, before Rey reveals that whilst connected to the Force she couldn’t see or feel Luke, meaning he had cut himself off from the Force. Not to harp on one note so repeatedly, but if Luke has severed his connection with the force, what in the holy Qui-Gon Jinn suddenly woke R2-D2 in Awakens? Was it simply another force user nearby? Then why not Leia? If not a force user, was R2 always able to wake up and waited till now? Even the scenes internal logic fails in that if Luke has no force power, how could he see or feel what was going in Rey? Attention to detail, this film has not.

Kylo and Rey communicate after Chewbacca gets his obligatory 10 seconds on screen (with Porgs) this time with Rey being firmer in her stance that Kylo is a monster. This exchange finally offers something interesting in her character when Rey is outside in the rain, she takes a moment to enjoy the water. Growing up on Jakku is seems almost certain she’s never seen that much water before, never mind having it fall from the sky. For a moment the angelic, perfect veneer was lifted to show us a character. The other interesting tid-bit is that once their exchange is over, Kylo has water on his glove from Rey’s side of things. Its unclear how this might be possible, but it does hold potential for something interesting. What remains uninteresting is the character of Rey – having never used a lightsabre before Awakens other than to defeat Kylo Ren (with no explanation other than Ren being injured) is now seen practicing with flawless technique. Still, having had zero instruction from Luke, or anyone, in its use she wields it like someone with years under her belt. She does momentarily lose control and slice the boulder she was practicing on, resulting in the near murder of two of the locals. Absent of any discernible weaknesses, struggles or imperfections, Rey will remain unrelatable and unrealistic. When Luke began using a lightsabre aboard the Falcon in New Hope he was realistically poor at it, with the moment of success being successfully deflecting 3 bolts from a practice droid. By Empire he had a few years in-between to practice, went to Degobah for extended training with Yoda, then went to fight Vader and was dispatched of like the novice he still was. Return of the Jedi saw Luke finally successfully wield his sabre, after months or years more training in between films, he took Jabba’s barge with his honed skills. Later, he would finally prove a match to Vader, but only when driven by his anger giving him the edge. What training or practice has Rey had? In Awakens she was shown fending off 3 attackers in a scuffle, before taking up the Lightsabre against Ren and being victorious. The next time we see her is now, days later in story. Further, it wasn’t until Empire that we saw Luke actually use the Force to retrieve his sabre, slowly, from the snow. Rey was given the power to persuade weaker minds, resist dark side mind intrusions, read Ren’s minds and pull the lightsabre to herself in Awakens. There was no learning curve for her, she is just naturally amazing at everything she tries. Luke was, at first, a person thrust in to a position of action that was out of his depth but would fight on because he had to. His struggle to succeed is relatable. Rey is and always has been perfectly equipped for every situation she has ever faced, removing any investment as her success is blatantly inevitable.

 

Luke’s next scene is his side of the flashback in which he did nothing wrong, in which, oddly, Luke says he failed because he was a “Skywalker, a Legend”. Within the film this makes little to no sense, his stature across the galaxy for his good deeds made Ben revolt? Nonsense. Even with the later revelations of considered murder, this statement makes no sense. We do then see Luke trying to contact Leia through the Force, which is good since he is now reconnected with it. Rey meanwhile picks up her conversation with Ren which takes the narrative in an even odder direction – Johnson tries to introduce some kind of romantic tension or element by having Ren appear topless, which makes Rey a little fluttery. Its an odd choice to try having this slightly humorous tone in the scene given that the conversation they actually have is about why Kylo hated Han Solo. Here Kylo tells Rey to stop relying on people, that it makes her weak and to “kill the past”. An expression that would seem to sum up Johnson’s feelings towards the franchise as a whole. Ren does also tell his side of the flashback, describing Luke as a psychotic lunatic who, for no reason, tried to kill him. Having highlighted how the whole attempted murder story poorly explains Luke’s exile, it does little to explain Kylo Ren. Fair enough, the set up was provided by Abram’s in Awakens, but Johnson had a significant amount of room to mould his story in and once again came up wanting. Is this one night the sole reason for Kylo murdering children, countless millions across the galaxy and being an all round unlikable guy?  Is there no other moment of significance that lead him to trying to conquer the galaxy? Did Snoke have nothing to do with his turn and subsequent killing spree? Is Johnson inferring that Kylo went rogue and bumped in to Snoke in the great black void? More evidence of less care being given to the details by a director uninterested in the world his film is about.

 

Back on the Island, Rey takes a look in to the previously seen dark hole before being pulled in. By the force? We can only guess as no effort is given to even loosely indicate anything. At the holes end is pool. Ah, so its like the place on Dagobah, it shows you what you fear, or some deep truth. The cave dark side has placed in a pool since she has no swimming experience, being from Jakku, would naturally struggle to swim, forcing her to overcome – oh no, she lands and just swims to the ledge. Pity, there could have been a character moment, some task Rey could struggle at. She finds herself in a corridor of infinite mirrors, to which she decides to speak (as Johnson has no concept of show, don’t tell) and asks to see her parents. Given the insinuations in Awakens about her lineage, this could have been a revelatory moment, to give Rey’s character some significance in the universe’s lore, but she only sees her self reflected back. Later revelations could colour this moment to be a way of showing her that meaning won’t come from the past or her family, but from within. Not the most positive of messages, certainly not in keeping with the “family is everything” of most of Star Wars franchise.

Rey and Kylo’s final force Skype takes place in her hut, in which Rey tells Kylo it is not too late to be redeemed and reaches out to him. Here the two finally occupy the same space on screen, sitting at the same fire, and touch their fingertips before Luke enters the hut by bringing it down around them. Rey lashes out at Luke, believing that he had tried to kill Kylo, the two have a small back and forth with sticks before Rey draws her sabre, takes down Luke Skywalker, who admits to drawing his sabre over Ben and being a failure. Rey then stands over him triumphant. Several, small problems with this sequence. Rey offers to help Kylo when all she knows is one side of a story from up to 20 years ago, then forgives the man who tried to kill her, her friends, did kill Han Solo and 5 planets worth of people. All because she saw him topless and sweaty in a force vision. Johnson has such wonderful and intriguing way of writing his characters. Her insistence on Ren’s goodness isn’t based out of any sense of goodness merely out of physical attraction him. At least, that’s how Johnson conveyed it to us. After Rey has left Luke embarrassed on his backside, he makes the decision to burn down the Jedi Temple and its texts. To stop him an old friend appears to remind him that even now there are things for Luke to learn – Yoda’s force ghost appears (begging more consistency questions regarding his and the other force ghosts’ whereabouts during Luke’s exile) and proceeds to introduce yet another universe breaking bit of lore. Once Luke has decided against his arson, Yoda summons a bolt of lightning to do the job for him. Let’s say that again; Yoda, a force ghost, creates a tangible impact on the real world from beyond the grave. If the force ghosts can make actual contact with the living and the world, what is to stop them from going to wherever trouble is and resolving it? Johnson offers no in world reason; the island isn’t especially rich in the force and the clouds don’t contain an abundance of midichlorians. Yoda also says that there is nothing in those texts that Rey doesn’t already possess. Yet again, Rey is more proficient in everything than literally everyone. Luke does receive one last morsel of wisdom from his former Master in that “failure, the best teacher is”. Finally, a constructive message from this script.

 

Back aboard the rebel fleet Poe and Holdo continuing their tête-à-tête. Despite being the core of the films narrative there is very little to say about this thread. Holdo continues to shuffle crews off the smaller ships in to the main cruiser, with the First Order destroying any flagging ship. Johnson further displays his lack of knowledge about space; as each small ship runs out of fuel they slow to a stop. Basic conservation of momentum in a vacuum would mean that even when the ship ran out of fuel it would have continued along its previous trajectory at the same speed until something actively stopped it. But Johnson needs to have the Order destroy an empty medical frigate to show how evil they are. As the fleet finds itself down to a single ship, Poe becomes more incensed that Holdo still refuses to share her plan. As already stated, having this secret kept by Holdo is only done so Johnson can have a reveal later for the audience and runs counter to how the narrative should have resolved to be satisfactory. Poe finally takes action when it is reveled Holdo’s plan is to pile all remaining people in to unarmed, shield-less shuttle pods and hope the Order don’t scan for them. Even now, when this could have served as the actual reveal, Johnson still has the plan to land at an old rebel base kept secret.  Given how suicidal the reveled part of the plan is, Poe, and seemingly everyone else, perform a mutiny against Holdo to allow Finn and Rose the chance to turn off the tracker. As if deliberately trolling the audience now, Johnson has Finn and Rose fail in their side quest making the entire expedition to Canto Bight utterly redundant. As Poe’s mutiny seems to have failed, he is distraught thinking that the vision of the galaxy he has being fighting for is over. Suddenly, Leia makes her return to the fray by blowing the door off the bridge and stunning Poe. It is now that we finally get the reveal of the full plan of landing on Krate at the old rebel base; the manner in which it’s handled is again odd, as Poe is wheeled in to a Pod, unconscious, Holdo and Leia stand laughing at how silly he was but yet how they both still like him. Holdo also remains aboard the cruiser to pilot it (again, ignoring how it would more or less fly itself) to vaguely provide cover for the escaping pods. Poe regains consciousness aboard a pod, at a loss for words as he thinks the resistance is coming to an end before Leia speaks up tell him about Krate. Further evidence that the secret plan is awful writing is that when Poe finally hears the real plan he says, “this might actually work”. Even in re-writing the character of Poe it was obvious to Johnson that a reasonable human being would be on board with the plan, making the suppression all the more contrived. Johnson needed to have his Finn and Rose story, which can only happen with Poe’s support, Poe would only support their plan without another viable alternative, to get Poe onside he has Holdo refuse to share her plan with her highest-ranking pilot and Holdo refuses to share because…. Johnson needed to complete the loop. There is no logical justification ever offered, a choice made worse when Leia tries to glorify her choices by saying “she was more focused on serving the light than on being a hero”. More platitude, sophistic sounding drivel that means absolutely nothing. Skipping a little further ahead to round off the Holdo portion of the narrative, the Order finds the escaping ships by running a “decloaking scan”, whatever that is and why ever it wasn’t already in use, launching what would be a final assault on the rebels. Realising her pod plan was as dangerous as Poe had thought, Johnson introduces not only another universe breaking element but brings in to question the internal logic of his own film. Holdo steers her cruiser to face Snoke’s Supremacy, engages the hyper speed and slams through it. True enough, the effect of the collision is quite beautiful but not enough to distract from all the narrative failings leading to and following it. If Hyperspace can now be weaponised it makes the attacks on Death Stars and Starkiller base seem unnecessary as a single ship could have ploughed through each of them instantly. Within Last Jedi, if Holdo has this move up her sleeve, why not use it earlier? Holdo had an entire fleet at her disposal, all of which were emptied of all personal, surely, they could have piloted a few of these in to the Order to provide an escape given how willingly they have sacrificed themselves before. Johnson seems so desperate to have the audience think of Holdo as a hero he twisted the entire core narrative and side plots just for that end. In the process he ended up positioning Poe as the antagonist to her, having Finn bumped down to assistant in a somehow more poorly written side narrative and made the First Order look so incompetent as to beggar belief as to how they would control a street corner, let alone the galaxy.

 

Following her conquest of Luke Skywalker and the Force on Ahch-To, Rey now fulfils her quest to copy the ending from Return of the Jedi by willingly turning herself over to Kylo and Snoke aboard the Supremacy. Much like Luke, Rey seeks to turn Kylo back to the light and their conversation is practically lifted from the pages of Episode VI’s script, down to the cuffs, elevator ride and the overlord’s throne room. Upon entering said throne room, we should have been getting the answer to another thread J.J. laid out in Awakens – why did Snoke want Rey bringing to him when he learned of her power? Previously, The Emperor wanted Luke brought before him to have him turn to the dark side by striking down his own father and to become his new apprentice. Here, it turns out that Snoke just wants to kill after she tells him where Luke Skywalker is. Snoke reveals that it was he who bridged Kylo and Rey’s minds which, given that Kylo saw Luke, should mean Snoke already has the location. Or at the very least could have gleaned it from Rey’s mind when linking the two of their minds. Whilst not billed as monumental story element, Snoke’s motivations surrounding Rey are incredibly rudimentary. It seems as if Johnson either lacked the imagination for a deeper purpose, couldn’t be bothered picking up the phone to Abram’s for a tip or was more focused on getting Rey to the Supremacy as to ignore the why, again.  Johnson further abandons the notion of universe building to continue his mission of subversion by ditching two more big threads from Awakens – namely who is Snoke and who are Rey’s parents? The first is dropped when Snoke instructs Kylo to execute Rey. Snoke sits speaking of how he is all knowing, how he can see in to Kylo’s mind, knows every thought that crosses his mind. As he dictates Kylo’s thoughts aloud, how Kylo “turns the lightsabre and strikes down his true enemy” he is oblivious to Kylo manipulating the lightsabre next to him. Kylo then activates the lightsabre, cutting Snoke in two, rendering him dead and unfulfilled. How did Snoke amass his power? Was he alive during the prequels and original trilogy? Was he trained by the emperor or is he possibly the Emperor’s mentor Darth Plagueis the Wise (who was said to have found away to stop death all together)? Johnson’s answer is again, it does not matter and you’re dumb for thinking it did. Rather than explain how such a powerful being existed, Johnson again cop’s out by, in his mind, removing the need to answer it at the expense of the overall narrative.

 

With Snoke lying dead in a heap, his Pretorian Guard attempt to take down Rey and Kylo in what is another well shot, good looking set piece. As with the rest, it fails in its attempt to distract from the failings around it and is itself full of logic failings. Even though the Pretorian are supposed to be the most elite of fighters, their attack patterns are ineffective enough to permit Johnson to get his glory shots. One such example is when three guards attack Rey at once but all three attack the same spot on Rey, so she can block them in a single move. Had one attempted to stab her anywhere else the fight would have been over. Another is as Rey tangles one on one with a guard who is wielding two blades she gets herself too close, should be stabbed by his second hand only for the second blade to seemingly have been edited away in between shots. Once the fight is over, Rey and Kylo go back to trying to turn each other to their way of thinking. Kylo revels to Rey and the audience the significance of her parentage, that had been built up in almost every other scene in Awakens and the answer is – nobody. Just a pair of drunks who traded her for drinking money. Wonderful.

 

It is obvious Johnson was attempting to have some kind of “anybody can be a Jedi, its not in your blood” message. It is an idea that runs counter to much of Star Wars, not including the idea of Midichlorians, as all the way back in original trilogy Luke directly says, “the force is strong in my family”. In the Prequels the Jedi Order were very particular about those they took on board implying there does exist some kind of variability in who can use the force. If it was a blanket “everyone can be a Jedi” then Jedi and Sith wouldn’t be special and everyone would be force users. It is also another instance of the perfect Rey issue. Her lineage could have assuaged those aggrieved by justifying her massive amount power through her parents. Instead, Johnson falls back on the idea that Rey is excellent as everything because she just is. There is a line Snoke says about how “when the Dark rises, the Light rises meet it”, vaguely implying that because Kylo (not Snoke) is so powerful, the force randomly selected Rey and imbued her with immense power to bring balance. Again, the prequels and original films were almost entirely about the characters actively trying to bring balance to the galaxy and the force; Anakin is literally prophesised as the chosen one who will bring balance to the force and Luke was a lone Jedi against two of the most powerful Sith to have ever existed, seeking to remove the Iron Fist of the Empire to let the galaxy be free again. Both Anakin and Luke needed extensive training to get a grip on their force powers, Rey was just naturally perfect at using it. Rey was simply imbued by the force to be the balance without working at it in any capacity. Johnson seems to have no awareness of how unrelatable, boring and unengaging a flawless character like Rey is. If she never struggles, never faces any adversity that she doesn’t overcome with consummate ease, is only guilty of wanting to have parental figures and seeing the good in people (Kylo), is powerful beyond measure without earning it and always, always wins, she isn’t a character. She is a robot.

 

To additionally highlight the idea of Rey and Kylo being exact equals the two decide not to join forces resulting in them fighting over the Skywalker Lightsabre. The two both use the force to pull it to themselves, pulling so much so that Johnson then destroys one of the most enduring artefacts in all of Star Wars as the lightsabre explodes in to two halves (and a smattering of crystal). At this stage, the invention of new words would be required to describe the frustration with the degree to which Johnson was actively burning the Big-Book-of-Star-Wars-Lore. It’s as if he sat down, made a list of the things people enjoyed in the previous films but titled it “useless bits that everyone hates”, assuming he would be super popular for ruining them. Nothing else would explain the verve with which he continues to try to unmake everything possible that came before. After the sabre explosion Rey simply disappears and Kylo assumes command of the First Order, with his first order being to follow the resistance down to Krate and exterminate them. With that, we mercifully reach the final scenes of this monstrosity.

 

Now within a cavernous base, complete with a contender for galaxy’s biggest door, Leia stands watch with the door open. Showing that Johnson is indeed capable of including useful exposition Poe tells Leia that the bases shields are now up preventing orbital bombardment, requiring the Order to add to the copycatting of the Original Trilogy by recreating the Hoth assault from Empire. Despite having had the majority of their fleet obliterated only minutes ago, the Order is able to immediately deploy multiple not-AT-AT walkers, TIE Fighters and something called a “laser battering ram”. Amazing how when a moment of incompetence would be justified, the Order are their most effective. Finn is once again full of knowledge after the it would have been useful, relaying that the laser is “miniaturised Death Star tech”. The Death Star used a multi-point green laser refracted through Khyber crystals and this ram is more of a heat ray, but at least Johnson is acknowledging something old without actively undermining it. Before the Walkers can make ground, a shuttle manages to crash under the closing door in to the base. Strangely, everybody opens fire with their rifles and pistols against a ship’s hull that is designed to withstand cannon fire but then it emerges that it is Finn and Rose aboard.

 

Finn and Rose came upon their shuttle after their failed attempt to deactivate the tracker lead to a haphazard escape. Having be captured aboard the Supremacy by BB-8’s Nazi cousin with the help of a betrayal by DJ (del Toro), Phasma finally re-emerges to dispense punishment. Phasma was talked up before both Awakens and Last Jedi as being a super important character that we all should definitely buy the figurine of because not only is Phasma important in the narrative but also gets brownie points for having a woman inside the suit. Sadly, with a grand total of 3 minutes screen time between both new films, the only significance Phasma had was in shifting some toys. Further, more poor writing makes her appear a little dim-witted via not understanding the basics of pain and execution. As the punishment is death Phasma says she wants do it in a manner that would be as unpleasant as possible, so naturally opts for decapitation by laser axe. A well renowned method of execution, beheading is almost as instant and painless a death as there can be. If suffering was the objective, then a significant wound to the guts is probably the slowest and most miserable manner. In a perfectly timed coincidence, Holdo’s suicide run gave Finn and Rose a chance to escape. BB-8 also becomes the first astro-mech droid to get a body count as it takes control of a smaller walker in the hanger. Finn and Phasma have a show down amidst the fire and debris, during which more bad editing breaks the flow. Phasma has a small group of troops at her back, who all suddenly disappear to permit the one on one standoff. Phasma also goes from being unarmed to laser pistol wielding and some of the dialogue exchanged is awful – “You were always scum” says Phasma to which Finn replies “Rebel Scum”. Their quick fight ends with Phasma, once again, seemingly falling to her death in giant fiery chasm. Given how she survived a trash compactor and the explosion of Starkiller Base, a bath in fire probably won’t stop her appearing in episode 9.

 

Before entering in to the final conflict, I would like to remind you of a few of the films messages, in one form or another, so as to better illustrate how its own ending works to upend itself. So far we have seen that Poe needs to get his head out the cock pit and that jumping in an X-Wing is not an answer. We have had two separate incidents of self-sacrifice that the film lauded, in the forms of Holdo and Rose’s sister. Both were spoke of with reverence following their sacrifice, standing as examples of heroism in the Resistance. Rey learned that Luke is waiting to die and, having easily conquered him in combat, no use to her. Finn has been on a whirlwind tour with Rose, learning about why he should stop trying to run from the fight and pick a side in it, find something to fight for. Finally, we learned that the Order are incompetent yet capable enough to dominate the galaxy.

 

Now, the Resist-ebls stand between a rock and hard place; their cave has only one entrance, now on the verge of being rendered useless by a laser, as the Order stand ready to exterminate them outside. Their base has no weaponry, only a shield to prevent orbital bombardment (information delivered in a throwaway line, when he wants to Johnson can give narrative information quickly and directly) and some scuttler’s. The ships are unarmed and falling apart. Naturally, the plan is to drive out against the Order’s line to somehow destroy the laser. Basic logic would suggest the plan required a Randy Quaid in Independence Day sacrifice, and yet…

Having taken positions in the trenches, the ships ride out directly at the new AT-AT’s and are not all immediately turned to dust. There are at least 11 Walkers, Kylo Ren’s personal ship and a host of TIE Fighters all shooting at a single line of enemies who are not shooting back. The TIE fighters are drawn off by the re-emerging Millennium Falcon, piloted by Chewbacca (complete with co-pilot Porgs) and with Rey in the gunner seat (who naturally makes every shot). Even without the aerial assistance, this should have been over in about 2 minutes. Realising the idiocy of their run, Poe orders everyone back to base. Again, surely the only plan with those ships was to crash one or two ships directly in to the laser. This was a suicide run the whole time, turning around means death as (so far as Poe knows) there is no other escape. So now, having been bludgeoned by Leia and Holdo in to doubting his instincts during to take things head on (now it would have been literal), he now does the exact opposite of the right thing. Fortunately, one of the pilots continues on alone to certain death. Finn, having finally found a cause he believes in, one he is willing to fight and die for, makes a beeline for the laser. His ship begins melting, falling apart around him. Whilst handled haphazardly at times, the story of a Stormtrooper abandoning his post, running from the fight before finally joining the cause against his former masters, to die fighting them has a nice poetry to it. Boyega made a fine addition to the universe of Star Wars and his death w—oh. That’s right. As Finn is about to plough in to the laser, give his life to save his friends, a second ship jack-knifes him, preventing his ship making it to the laser. Rose is the mystery pilot, of course. It is here that this film, somehow find a new low to sink to in its writing. Finn incredulously asks why she stopped him and Rose replies “I saved you dummy. That’s how we will win. Not by fighting what we hate, but by saving what we love.” In a single sentence, Rose manages to sum up everything wrong with the writing here. What she says sounds like it means something but really means absolutely nothing. Mere fruity sounding sophistry coming at the expense of the scene and narrative around it. “Saving what we love” is the exact thing Finn was about to do, by offering his life he would be saving his friends, his loved ones. It’s the same sacrifice that Holdo and Tico Number Two committed, but when Finn tries it, now it’s the wrong choice. Perhaps, Johnson only wanted the female characters to do the important things, to remove any agency of the males. It would explain a great deal about the writing and marries up well with Kathleen Kennedy’s “The Force is Female” political messaging. But that is a story for another time.

 

Even as a basic arrangement of objects in the scene, the logic is non-existent. As every other ship turned around, Finn went to full speed in a straight line. How is there any conceivable path that got Rose to the laser as the exact same time as Finn? Answer – There just isn’t. Following that, the two sit meters away from the line of walkers who never fire a single at the now stationary people. Not to mention that Finn then builds a sled to drag Rose the several kilometres back to the cave without being shot upon. Utter nonsense. Further incompetence on behalf of the screenwrit- I mean, the First Order. Back in the cave, we see a reunion denied us in Force Awakens of Luke and Leia. This is the second time the film managed to handle a scene without ruining it, with the reunion being quite emotional as the long-separated siblings come together. Luke emerges from a rear cavern before heading on to the new hole in the door. He looks different than we last saw him, his hair is cut more like his Original trilogy look, his beard his shorter with fuller colour. Luke has arrived, and with him a glimmer of hope. Striding out to face down the first order with his laser sword, Poe deduces that Luke is delaying the Order to give them time to escape via the cavern Luke came from. Seeing Luke standing before him at his moment of glory, Kylo orders all weapons to blast Luke. Extensively. Once stopped, Luke walks from the dust, unharmed (slightly ruined by the dusting off the shoulder motion). Kylo descends to confront his former mentor. The confrontation between these two is something that the film thinks you are going to see as epic. Sadly, it did so little to establish their relationship or feelings beyond “I hate him” and “I failed him” that, combined with the substandard writing, it never comes close. Luke is given a few lines that Johnson intends to be the quotable, cool lines such as “Every word of what you just said is wrong” but it is delivered in follow up to line that draws attention to how Johnson wanted to include the cool sounding line, regardless of how it fit. Luke then states that the Rebellion has been reborn, and he will not be the last Jedi. Again, it doesn’t quite mesh with the other narrative goings-on; Leia sent out a distress beacon, begging for help, to reform the Rebellion and not a soul responded to it. Totalling about 20-25 people, the Resistance is barely big enough to fully book a party venue. A galactic fighting force they are not. Furthermore, Luke’s stance for 15-20 years has been seeing the extermination of the Jedi and here has turned it around. Changing his mind here should be monumental in the films narrative, Luke Skywalker finally re-embracing the hero within. However, given that the Luke we had been shown was so fundamentally not in keeping with the OT Luke, buying in to his character and subsequent arc was a non-starter. Mostly because by the films end we are still missing huge chunks of Luke’s story arc; Luke’s arc goes all the way back to A New Hope before resuming here but the crucial period in-between is all but vacant. A single, inexplicable incident over a decade ago is not enough to link the young Luke with the hermit played by Hamill here, resulting in this turn falling flat.

 

Kylo and Luke’s standoff is played as the calm of the Jedi against the rage of the Sith with Kylo charging in and Luke avoiding his swings. Animation wise, Luke’s matrix leaning dodge does not look great – the movement looks too unnatural and too CG. Worst of all, the two never lock lightsabres marking the Last Jedi as the first main line Star Wars film not to have a sabre duel, a self-inflicted ignoble distinction. Their engagement ends when Kylo lands what should be a killing blow only for Luke to be unharmed. Johnson reveals yet another super impressive subversion of audience expectations by having Luke not really be on Crait, he is projecting himself through the force as a distraction. It’s a moment again that Johnson thinks will be impressive, unexpected and cool but is just frustrating. Earlier in the film, on Ach-to Johnson deliberately showed us Luke’s X-Wing submerged in the shallows – Chekov’s X-Wing, if you will – which in normal circumstances would have been foreshadowing to how Luke returns to the fray. Imagine, for a moment, that when the Falcon arrived in the attack it had been Luke in his X-Wing. It would better justify Kylo’s move of sending all his TIE fighters in pursuit. Follow that up with Luke hovering his X-Wing in front of Order line leading to Kylo ordering him blasted to pieces, only to emerge unscathed. Luke’s power would be amply displayed, showing that even with how powerful Kylo or even Rey might appear, they have much left to learn. Sure, the film tells us it takes an incredible power for Luke to project himself, but it is a vague, intangible sense of power. Speaking of tangible power….

 

Distracting the Order having worked, Luke opened the window for the remaining Rebel/Resistors to escape through the cavern only to find a cave in has sealed it up. Fortunately, Rey finds herself on the other side of the rockslide; she calls back, aloud and alone, to her earlier quip of “lifting rocks” before raising a hand and moving the several tons of stone in a single motion. Forgetting that neither of the two new films has justified Rey’s power level, all previous lore – films, games, books, comics – have shown the process of gaining power in the Force as a slow process. Even the other Jedi character in this film took 3 films, spanning roughly 3 and half to 4 years of in world time, to become a competent (but still rough round the edges) force user. In Empire we see Luke straining to lift even a small rock in training, as well his failure to pull the X-Wing from the swamp. It is this that makes audiences invest in Luke’s story but be indifferent to Rey’s. We followed Luke as he learned, as he struggled and out right (handedly) fails. Repeatedly. Failing makes his success so enjoyable. Rey has never failed. Never even struggled. Every task is completed, every skill already acquired. She has no arc, no learning curve to speak of. Rey was a sympathetic underdog for much of Awakens despite being successful at everything in that too, but JJ gave her humanising moments – her awe meeting Han Solo & learning about the Jedi, her friendship with Finn and her wide-eyed nature (“I never there was this much green in the whole galaxy”) – serving to counter balance her inexplicable abilities. JJ also left room to justify those abilities through her lineage. Johnson managed to strip away the humanising moments, made her power levels even more absurd and removed the narrative-out of powerful ancestry. What remains is a non-character, who can at a whim over come any adversity, with nothing to invest in or get attached to, removing all tension whenever she is involved. We also learn that Luke’s revelation that the Jedi texts that were unimportant and in fact the things holding him back are safely stowed away aboard the Falcon. What little there was in the scene with Yoda is largely undone, as it appears it was an empty gesture done with the knowledge the texts were safe.

 

With the remaining rebels/resistors escaping aboard the Falcon, Luke’s diversion accomplished he tells Kylo (in an oddly Han Solo way) “I’ll see you round, kid” before fading away. We join him back on Ach-to as he collapses from the exertion at the temple cliff edge. He raises a hand to his chest where Kylo struck his projection, suggesting that some damage reached back, before he stares at the twin sunsets and fades away permanently. Avoiding crude language has been a challenge at times whilst constructing this analysis with no harder test than with this scene. The deliberate destruction of Luke Skywalker in this film is going to haunt the franchise, Rian Johnson and Kathleen Kennedy for decades to come. If fans resented what the prequels changed in the lore then reactions to this could be described as significantly loathsome, bordering on out-right anger. Even worse still, it caused an apathy towards Modern Star Wars in general. Rumours were around during shooting that Kathleen Kennedy was so happy with Johnson’s work on Last Jedi she was lining up a whole new trilogy for him to write and direct. One would hope that those plans have at least been placed on the back burner, especially given the looming cloud hanging over the upcoming Solo: A Star Wars Story. It is possible the dissatisfaction amongst the fanbase at large could see the film be a box-office blunder, either in the form of minor protest or simply being turned off this current crop of Star Wars films completely. As you can see, avoiding talking about Luke being unceremoniously axed from the franchise that is still reliant on riding his coattails is preferable than doing so.  As if taking one of cinemas most enduring heroes, the archetypal hero story, and throwing him face down to the dirt, grinding his boot in wasn’t bad enough, Johnson then childishly removes any chance for the character to be redeemed by killing him. Almost as if he knew that leaving Luke alive would allow Episode 9 director Colin Trevorrow (now J.J. Abrams again after Trevorrow left shortly before release of 8. Don’t worry, Kathleen Kennedy told us it had nothing to do with how poorly Last Jedi lined up stories for the next film) would permit Luke to be written more faithfully, which would only further highlight how poorly he himself had written Luke, so to spare further embarrassment removed Luke from future films. Johnson throws in a line from Rey to Leia about look fading away in peace, with purpose. Unaware that having a character say something is so, does not in fact make it so. Nothing in Luke’s story presented would suggest he has found peace, nor did he seem to have found any purpose – appearing on Crait for 90 seconds to be naught more than a distraction is hardly a significant end goal. Luke’s demise has also caused a real-world loss for the fans in that Johnson managed to sap Mark Hamill’s joy for his character, the pure delight he brought will now be absent. For 40 years Hamill carried the banner of Star Wars with joy and pride, revelling in the fandom. He loved how important people thought he and his character were in their lives. Now, Hamill (as seen in almost every interview in the last year) has had his passion quenched by a director and executive who simply had no regard for him, his role or the fans who had invested decades in his story. Treating his presence more as nuisance to be dealt with rather than the headline-act he should have been. After all, we should let the past die and kill it if we have to, right?

The final image we see is the child slaves on Canto Bight, still in servitude exactly as they were before Finn and Rose trampled through. They are telling the story of Luke Skywalker standing up to the Order before one boy stands up and uses the force to bring his brush to him. How the story got to them is anyone’s guess, it seems unlikely that the dozen rebels left would be going to Canto Bight to share a story and even less likely that Order would in any capacity acknowledge those events. Sure, Johnson tries to leave the film on some kind of happy note but is so vapid as to only induce eye rolling at this stage.

 

Despite this being over 14,000 words there are issues that weren’t even touched, to have listed all the problems from all sides could fill several encyclopaedias and will surely see this film be shown to film students to highlight a myriad of basic writing, directing and technical skills should not be implemented. A display of how no amount of money to create pretty pictures can hide the hollowness beneath. In a few years (or less in the internet age) as happened with the prequels, a small number of fans will stand by their unrealistic praise, some will begrudgingly accept it to allow complete saga watch-throughs, but most will probably never watch it again. Many will likely step around it like Attack of the Clones or skip through it for one or two bits they enjoy like Phantom Menace. Hopefully, J.J. can do something to set right the innumerable wrongs of Johnson’s display but so thorough was the dismantling, that even Lucas and Spielberg couldn’t salvage it. All eyes will be on Solo: Star Wars Story, if Disney releases two back to back films that the majority of audiences hate or don’t enjoy, particularly if the second is a box office failure, then the brand as a whole could find itself in danger. It may take a good while before the fanbase moves on from this but there is always hope that something great will once again be produced in the most loved galaxy far, far away.