The Last Jedi
Dec. 28th, 2017 11:07 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
I watched The Last Jedi and liked but did not love it.
Mostly mild and vague spoilers:
1. My brother and I were talking about it after and agreed that the main reason we liked but didn't love it was because it assumed a lot of interest in a character we both find boring. (He actually had stronger words than that, but we'll leave it at "boring")
2. I get what they were doing, and Mark Hamill did the best he could, but I couldn't reconcile that with Luke's characterization.
3. Why did the men in their 30s get the character arcs that are best suited for character in their late teens/early 20s ("angry and conflicted young man with raw talent" and "talented hotshot who thinks he knows best but doesn't") while the male character who actually is in his early 20s get relegated to a B plot despite being colead of the last movie?
4. I did very much appreciate the rejection of the "a bad man can be redeemed if a good woman just commits herself to redeeming him" trope. It's not that it's a bad trope or that it can't be done well, but after so many things saying that that's the female leads role, it was great for a major franchise to go "NOPE. NOT HER JOB."
5. I very much appreciated more Leia, Connix, and Poe and very much enjoyed Rose.
Mostly mild and vague spoilers:
1. My brother and I were talking about it after and agreed that the main reason we liked but didn't love it was because it assumed a lot of interest in a character we both find boring. (He actually had stronger words than that, but we'll leave it at "boring")
2. I get what they were doing, and Mark Hamill did the best he could, but I couldn't reconcile that with Luke's characterization.
3. Why did the men in their 30s get the character arcs that are best suited for character in their late teens/early 20s ("angry and conflicted young man with raw talent" and "talented hotshot who thinks he knows best but doesn't") while the male character who actually is in his early 20s get relegated to a B plot despite being colead of the last movie?
4. I did very much appreciate the rejection of the "a bad man can be redeemed if a good woman just commits herself to redeeming him" trope. It's not that it's a bad trope or that it can't be done well, but after so many things saying that that's the female leads role, it was great for a major franchise to go "NOPE. NOT HER JOB."
5. I very much appreciated more Leia, Connix, and Poe and very much enjoyed Rose.
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Date: 2017-12-29 08:47 am (UTC)Yep. She gave it one good shot, and then she walked away. I wasn't impressed by Rey trying to turn Kylo Ren in the first place, but she is very young, raised herself, *and* doesn't have the benefit of each movie-goer's hindsight and foresight.
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Date: 2017-12-29 03:36 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2017-12-29 10:16 pm (UTC)Ooh, that makes so much sense in context, yes.
I guess I followed the Star Wars school of thought: bad character as a quality, rather than a profession. And downright murder is a different level altogether.
But certainly Han and Chewie have willingly caused loss and suffering, too, and Finn must have done so as a cog in the First Order Machine, perhaps less willingly but more wittingly.
And yes, they all turned around and said, No More (if only Finn for internal reasons). And Rey looking at them and thinking, Well, People Do That as to Kylo Ren makes her more understandable.
Sent from my iPhone
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Date: 2017-12-29 02:11 pm (UTC)