Alright, finally saw it a second time. wanted to see it twice before really giving detailed thoughts on things.
I will say, I can see why casuals/new fans might be loving this movie. or anyone I suppose. It was a really pretty movie, had some really great moments and music. It was extremely well made. A lot of my problems with the movie have more to do with the "semi hardcore" fan stance more than anything. I still think it is one of the better Star Wars films... but that might say more about the fact that a lot of the star wars films are kinda meh.
I think Kylo was extremely well done... it is interesting having a villain that isnt "finished" yet and watching him evolve. I thought Rey was fine-ish.. she had some really good moments although I have my issues with the character. The fight against the red guard dudes was really cool. Yoda was cool.
For the quick nick pick side before we get heavy... the porgs were stupid, chewie was wasted, r2d2 was wasted, timeline was weird (and I don't think Carrie Fischer can act at all, not to speak ill of the dead), and I wish they didn't make Hux into some kind of a mini joke at the beginning.
My 100% biggest issue with this whole movie is Snoke. Not even just the fact that Abrams, Kennedy, Rian and Co acted like hsi origin was this huge mystery we would figure out and then didnt... but f*ck he is soooooooooooo important and such a huge plot issue to this universe. and he was actually really really really freaking cool and well acted and well designed.
How in this galaxy did a dark side user THIS powerful (he may have been the strongest force user we've seen on the big screen) avoid any Jedi or Palpatine detection all these years? We know there are other dark users than the Palpatine line sith from the cartoons but yeesh... this is a whole other beast of strength. And as Luke stated, that I didn't catch the first viewing... Snoke was in Kylo's brain trying to turn him from the beginning. He felt him when he had his "imma murder my nephew" moment.
So you have a ridiculously powerful dark side user (that acts just like a Sith but apparently isn't lol? wut?) who was able to turn a Skywalker right under THE jedi masters nose... and luke knew who he was and what he was trying to do... and we know nothign about him whatsover? Its like Abrams was basically tasked with doing a remake/update of New Hope and copied it to a tee and just didn't bother to think any of this through and Rian didn't want any part of it and moved on.
I know some people are like "well you don't have to know all the backstory!" but for someone this powerful I feel you did. if you are gonna have an extended universe you gotta play by those rules.
But that kinda leads to one of my big problems with Luke. Luke knew Snoke existed. Knew what he was trying to do.... why didn't he try and go murder snoke instead of murder his nephew lol?
I just really wanted to see a bad ass Luke. In a flashback or something. Yes the force projection was a damn cool power feat but... I just wanted to see the dude cut some peopel down with a saber. Is that really too much to ask lol? I generally liked a lot of his jedi thoughts about Balance and how there is always the balance and how the jedi caused a lot of the problems (or let them happen accidentally). I don't know how you do THAT type of ending though without the force projection thing. It would have been cool for Luke to f*ck up the walker mechs with the force but then there is no way he could lose to kylo and with snoke dead he had no equal. So I guess he had to kinda die but... meh.
I do wonder if they would have killed luke off if they knew Fischer wasn't going to be around. They have no "nostalgia" left really as all the important OT characters are gone.
I thought Poe had a interesting lil arc that is likely to set him up as THE leader/commander next movie (especially with Fischer dead). He royally f*cked up multiple times this movie but by the end I think he was showing true leadership and I think that wast he point.
Rey is just... almost too much sometimes.She just doesn't have any flaws other than caring too much lol? She didn't stop going straight to the dark? I just feel like the more intersting story would have actually been a Jedi Finn.
Speaking of Finn... what a GD f'ing waste of a character and great actor. The Canto side arc was all around sh*t. IT only existed to show off teh "hey look weird goofy aliens!" part of star wars movies and to give Boyega somethign to do. The code breaker being a traitor was so damn telegraphed. Rose had a use but I don't like the pairing and the suicide save at the end was just dumb. Finn isn't force sensitive, Finn can't pilot like Poe, and he isn't a leader so... what freaking use does he have next movie? He may have been better off just dying in the suicide run. Plus, his beef was Phasma was terrible, that fight sucked and surprise surprise... no straight win for Finn. Cut out the Canto arc crap and show me more Rey/Luke training (we never saw the third lesson) and the movie would have been better for it.
Can I still hold out hope Finn is force sensitive and Rey will train him next movie? No? not at all? Not even a low level jedi type? Please 
I can’t put myself in the casual fan category for Star Wars, but I could see why its doing so well with casual fans. It is a great looking movie and it has action and some jokes and Porgs. I don’t think it’s as breezy or fun as Guardians of the Galaxy or Thor: Ragnarok but is better than Transformers: The Last Knight (and every other Transformers film) and Valerian in comparison to other intergalactic adventure films. And it’s a quicker paced sci-fi film than Blade Runner 2049. I could also see the praised dismantling of nostalgia as a way to ease up on continuity to make Star Wars more appealing to even more people who haven’t seen the original films and have no desire to watch them, read up on them or the Star Wars world, or watch the cartoons, read the novels, or play the video games. I also think the omnipresent marketing, and the decades long deep penetration of Star Wars into pop culture compels moviegoers to see TLJ, just like the other Star Wars films.
While I thought TLJ did a better job developing Ren I don’t buy him as a credible threat. He is very much unfinished, but it doesn’t work for me. Even his unpredictability hasn’t really resulted in some dastardly act so far. He destroys equipment when he gets upset and doesn’t Force choke or kill First Order officers. I also think him being unfinished doesn’t work because Rey, while also unfinished in her training, is already his superior. She doesn’t have to get her weight up, so to speak, to defeat him. He’s not a real challenge to her physically, so perhaps Episode IX will delve more into the psychological challenge Ren presents for her. That is one of the better parts of TLJ, Johnson did a good job creating a situation that could tempt Rey. Rey and Ren also neatly gets Rey away from Finn.
TLJ made a big deal about separating the ‘legend’ of Luke from the real person, however the idea of Luke’s legend is based on the EU mostly and has not been evidenced on screen post-ROTJ. So perhaps that was a swipe at the old fans for some reason, Johnson being an Alpha nerd who wants to show he’s better than the other nerds or something. But the funny thing is while Luke was being deconstructed, the legend making was continuing with Rey. So, the idea of being a legend isn’t so bad really, it’s just who the legend is supposed to be. I did like in TLJ that Rey’s search for identity, for a place in the universe, was more front and center than in TFA. In TFA, she was rooted to the past, her diehard belief that her parents would return to Jakku and retrieve her. Johnson strips that away in TLJ and thereby gives Rey some vulnerability, though by the end of the film it seems like she’s made her choice and that’s probably it for real character development. So far we haven’t really seen Rey fail. TLJ came the closest with Snoke’s interrogation, but of course, Ren was there to take out Snoke. But Ren is too weak-emotionally or otherwise-and ‘needs’ Rey at his side.
Poe very well could be the leader, though I would see him more of a fighting leader (so we can have more dazzling X-wing action) than sitting in some room making decisions. It’s likely that we might get another female admiral or official leading the rest of the Resistance, and having Poe back out leading the fight in his X-wing in Episode IX.
How Snoke was handled was disappointing. Sure, his death was a nice surprise-in the moment-but then you realize what a waste of a character it was. Why build him up only to kill him? And while some say he doesn’t matter, that’s because he didn’t matter to Rian Johnson and the film’s defenders are going to spin every decision made in this movie into a genius move. I don’t fully blame Johnson because Abrams just created Snoke and IMO had no idea who the character was, what his motivation was, and just left it for the next person to deal with. The idea that Snoke and Luke are two sides of the same coin, both want the Jedi and Sith to die in a sense, was a neat idea that wasn’t explored much at all. In part because Johnson was in a hurry to take out the elders so that Ren and Rey could take center stage. They might as well just made Snoke a Sith and his early exit might not have been so bad since we at least could assume what he was about then. Perhaps Ren will continue being a Vader fanboy and just restart the Sith.
It bothers me that some of the film’s defenders crap on ‘nostalgia’ and IMO like the idea of not using Sith or Jedi or minimizing them, while they turn a blind eye to all the other nostalgic characters, things (Millennium Falcon, TIE Fighters, lightsabers) or allusions (First Order/Empire, Resistance/Rebellion) that are still in the sequel films. Johnson or Disney are not as bold or radical or different as they claim. And if some of the defenders actually had read the EU or researched it a little without dismissing the old fans and the EU fans then they might discover that some of these ‘new’ and ‘bold’ things have already been covered in previous books or comics.
Finn as a Jedi would be something. I think they’ve trashed his character so much by this point I don’t know if even that would help, but it would be something. Right now, what skill does he have, except for infiltrating First Order ships/bases? Like you said, a waste of a good actor. I liked the Phasma fight at first, but on second thought, it wasn’t that great. For one it wasted Phasma who should’ve won that fight, and two it really wasn’t a clean win for Finn like I had thought when I watched it at first. Even though I’m not a fan of black characters sacrificing themselves for white characters, I’ll make an exception for Finn because I think his sacrifice was a moment of character growth for him and could’ve completed his arc. He went from fear of the First Order to being willing to die to stop them. I’m not a fan of the Rose-Finn pairing either, and her robbing Finn of his agency on Crait was one of several issues I had with their relationship. Though I knew that’s where Disney wanted to go when I learned about Rose and Finn going on an adventure together. I’m not an advocate of interracial relationships in the media, when it comes to black folks, because I feel there is an ulterior motive behind the depictions (an implicit knock against black-black intraracial relationships), but all that being said, I think Daisy Ridley and John Boyega have really good chemistry and it should be Rey and Finn together. Ridley has chemistry with Adam Driver too, but she has stronger chemistry with Boyega.
I don’t see them making Boyega a Jedi. And as for Rey training him, she needs training her damn self. I think Disney is making a mistake by deemphasizing Jedi training. It sets a bad precedent going forward, to just have characters be great fighters and so forth without any training (it removes some of the rules for this world, just like the hyperspace jump thing, and if they don’t replace those rules, it’s creating a vacuum). It also sends a bad message to kids that they don’t have to work hard, study, or train. But it is in keeping with the instant celebrities of our social media age. At least TLJ had Rey steal the Jedi books. I wish they had had a holocron instead. That way they could bring back Qui-Gon, Mace, Yoda, Luke, and various other Jedi to instruct her. Or that they bring back Shaak Ti. I think they repealed her death twice before Disney took over so from a canon standpoint she’s still out there. And they might actually allow a female Jedi to teach Rey something. Just saw on Shaak Ti’s Wookieepedia page that she did create a holcoron that Luke retrieved. It could be a great way to introduce another Jedi, and move away from the Skywalker line, while at least removing the criticism that Rey is too untrained.
I definitely understand how you felt about Luke not getting a really bad ass moment. I think it would’ve been a great scene and a great payoff for fans of the original movies to finally see Luke fully trained and at his height. I would’ve been fine with a flashback and even Hamill lookalike Sebastian Stan doing the fighting if they had to. I don’t get the disdain by some for ‘fan service’. I think it has to be balanced like everything else and put into the furtherance of a good story. But the idea that Disney shouldn’t do it, that its some kind of ‘pandering’ feels insulting to me like its more crapping on old fans. So, what exactly do these ‘new’ fans want out of Star Wars?
