A/V Episode VIII - THE LAST JEDI - Official Movie Discussion Thread

I think A is a stretch at best to say that.

B would not be so bad if he wasn't hitting it and again a stretch to say his guts were out. Just a few spots of blood it seems.

C is hmm maybe (assuming he's not ambidextrous) but even so a guy with of training should still be able to beat somone who'd never even handled one before that day. The fact he got whipped suggests Rey should not be to worried about meeting him again.

 

Not my post (Credit goes to SomedayWeMightBeDead on imugr) but this is my favorite response to the "How did Rey beat Kylo" debate.

People keep complaining about the fact that Finn and Rey beat Kylo at the end of TFA.

"He's so weak!"

"Beat by two nobodies!"



"Bitch got rofl-stomped by newbs!"

Did you watch the movie?

Did you pay attention at all?

Let's rewind a bit, and talk about something that comes up over a dozen times; Chewie's bowcaster.

The movie is like a freaking infomercial for the epic tons of **** you and everything around you for the next twenty feet that this badass piece of weaponry dishes out like second helpings of your grandma's world famous mashed potatoes.

We see time again Chewie dealing heaping truckloads of **** that guy and his entire lineage with this death-dealing weapon of pure carnage. He hits a Stormtrooper in the breadbasket and sends that poor sod flying twenty feet back into a wall as his armor shatters on the ground.

Han makes a point of asking Chewie if he can try it out, and then proceeds to obliterate five (two*) troopers with one easy shot.

Let's not mince words here. Chewie's Bowcaster is like the unholy love child of the original ****ing crossbow and a howitzer. The Empire should have just strapped this piece of weaponized **** you to the front of an asteroid, aimed it Alderaan, and saved themselves the trouble of housing a giant space station.

So...after being shown the pure unadulterated hell that spews forth from this hand-held death cannon in a deluge of destruction and demise, we can all agree that being shot with this thing tops a long list of things you don't want to happen to you.

Well, it happens to Kylo Ren.

And, what does he do? Well, he doesn't get thrown through the air like every other ****ing thing that gets hit by this murder machine. In fact, he just kind of takes a knee for a minute. He doesn't get instantly wrecked while careening through the air hoping for the sweet release of death. He gets up, and proceeds to walk it the **** off.

But, he doesn't just quit there. He doesn't just walk off what everything else in the universe instantly dies from. He goes out to find a couple bitches, and tear them apart.

The amount of control, the amount of pure Force power to stay standing after taking a shot like that is mind-bending. But, he doesn't just stay standing. He goes out and fights. He should have been dead right there, or at least screaming in pain as his insides fought to be outside his body.

But, he fights. He's using untold amounts of pure Force energy to keep his insides inside, to keep himself conscious, to keep his legs, arms, and body moving, all while fighting two people who, until this point, haven't really been spending a ton of energy. They're practically fresh. And, no training? Finn's a STORMTROOPER. He's been combat trained since childhood. You bet your ass he can handle himself in a fight. And, Rey? Rey's been kicking ass hand-to-hand since before she can remember. Sure, it's an unfamiliar weapon, but you give someone, with an inkling of how to fight, a stick and they'll hold their own.

Of course two people beat Kylo at the end. Dude's nursing a gut wound that would put down a Rhino on steroids. The question shouldn't be how did Finn and Rey beat him.

It should be this:

If Kylo Ren could do all of that after taking that kind of hit...how in the **** are they going to stop him when he's at one hundred percent?

 

Let's see, after the deed he falls to his knees crying and the novelization goes into quite a bit of detail about his internal turmoil in that moment. When he first confronts Finn and Rey he is still crying.

Really? We're talking about a gun that blew a hole in Nines big enough for Chewie to put his fist through



and has been shown capable of taking out multiple soldiers with one shot. And each round has enough kinetic force behind it to send its target flying through the air. And Kylo took a direct hit from this weapon, with these characteristics, and you think that it did what? Only put a few scratches on him? The reason he is hitting his belt is to keep it up so something important doesn't spill out the side while he is moving.

Ok, let me get this straight. You think a guy who just took the Star Wars equivalent of a .50 round to his side and got cut in his dominate arm with the equivalent of a plasma torch should have no trouble whatsoever defeating a combatant who is both uninjured and established to have previous experience in melee combat (the scene where she beat up the thugs on Jakku)? And the fact that he couldn't means he is not a threat?

.....

I think you need to reassess your grading scale for character combat effectiveness.

 

It was sort of expected due to Anakin's cover placement, but even so, it still really fractured the NJO fan base. People were seriously pissed off by the move, which wasn't helped by the EoV books that preceded it. Much like HP4 and the development then killing off of Cedric Diggory, killing off Anakin was seen by quite a few as underhanded and bad form.

Will ep 8 be that? Well, unless the Republic remnant acts really stupid, like suicidal stupid and the First Order deploy Force-sensitive hunting acid-blooded bio-engineered beasties, which out-do Giger's Alien in the gross department - and they get Zack Snyder in to slo-mo the hell out of a character getting drenched in acid blood... Probably not.

 

I don't see it happening.

If Rey had been a dude then they might've gone there, but I cannot envision them killing off their first front-and-centre female Jedi lead.

Or, at least, I can't imagine it sticking. If Kylo kills her during E8 then it'll be for the big reveal that Snoke is Plagueis as he restores her to life.

 

Borrowing this idea.

 

It's also worth mentioning that, even though he is injured, Rey only actually beats Kylo by letting go of her fear and going into a Force-inspired god-mode. I think of it very much as the equivalent of the Ganner episode in Traitor. Jedi who open themselves to the Force can be empowered many times their natural level of skill by the "will of the Force." It's not necessarily something that's going to happen the next time they fight, though, especially if Kylo Ren is uninjured.

 

Random thought of the night: I really hope we see a "Jedi Ghost Council" in 8... Luke discussing recent events with the ghosts of Obi-wan, Yoda, and his father (possibly Qui-gon).

Didn't the novel say she tapped into the dark side, and Snoke was speaking into her mind, when she did that?

 

I'm reminded of Rebels, where Kanan defeated the Grand Inquisitor fairly easily in their final confrontation by letting go and letting the Force guide him, yet did not then proceed to easily cut through every Inquisitor he encountered in the next season. As someone said during a discussion about that, while there are certain people like Vader who are far above most others, duels in Star Wars (and in real life, for that matter) generally don't operate according to the fixed fighting anime style power levels notion a lot of people here seem to think they do.

 

Yes. That moment was as good as it was for me because "SHE DECIDES TO WIN" flashed across my brain as it happened.

Thank-you, Stover.

Up until that point it seems far more like Kylo -- despite his injury -- is simply taking her measure. Getting a feel for what she can and can't do. Thus, "You need training".

 

Mark Hamill says he is going to release a Rian approved spoiler in a few hours.

 

"Luke Skywalker is in the movie."



Or something to that effect.

 

Probably, but I hope for something more.

 

"Rey carries me around on her back"

 

Kind of like, oh IDK, Luke making a immensely difficult shot without a targeting computer on the DS by doing a similar thing in ANH.

You know if she'd effortlessly beaten him down when he was at full strength, instead of barely beating him even when he wasn't, or if he'd been established as actually being "another Vader" instead of a unstable wannabe, or if she hadn't been the first of the three trilogy's Jedi leads to get captured (easily) in her first film, then I MIGHT find these arguments more convincing. But they aren't and I don't.

 

Luke passing on what he learned from Yoda


From Mark Hamill's twitter:
https://twitter.com/HamillHimself/status/719239858087182336

 

Episode VIII is shaping up pretty well.

https://twitter.com/HamillHimself/status/719239858087182336




Edit: JINX! Lol.

 

Yup. Ok. I'm officially over the EU being rebooted because that gave me such a burst of joy I just don't care about anything as much as this anymore.

ALL HAIL DISNEY WARS OUR BENEVOLENT OVERLORDS

 

i hope not. star wars may very well be dependent upon Rey going forward

 

Can we have a dedicated thread just for that photo because

 

How is this still a valid point? He was severely wounded, psychologically scarred, and most importantly, not trying to kill her.

So...that's how.

 

And moar. (reddit so be cautious )

 

I love that picture.

 

Yeah, I agree.

The backlash would be enormous (in my opinion validly so).

I think they've written themselves into a corner where they can't really go for a "shocking protagonist death!" as a plot twist, because their two leads are a white lady and a black dude, and killing off ladies and black dudes for "shock" value is its own trope by now. Kill either Rey or Finn and that's the trope you're gonna be reinforcing - not that no one is safe, but that certain types of people aren't safe. Potentially limiting to the narrative and therefore arguably a limitation on pure creativity? Sure, but also 100% a product of the media landscape we've created. Also no story is invented in a vaccum - no story comes from pure creativity anyway.

I guess I also don't see it as a huge loss since I don't think the "shocking protagonist death" trope is really one that Star Wars needs, tonally, in this trilogy. I think it worked find in the NJO, but that had a very different set of goals in juxtaposing itself against the OT. We had the death of the hero instead of the death of the mentor. The ST has already played its hand on that front: we got the death of the mentor, in Han Solo.

Killing Anakin Solo was in many ways as shocking as it was because he was the gifted, chosen, perfect mix of Han and Luke hero. And cynically I'm still sure they only went through with it because they felt like they had a spare with Jacen.

Like, I guess I'm just not convinced - perhaps especially after the last few months of telly - that unexpectedly killing your female lead is particularly original, or even that surprising any more.

 

Mark Hamill - evil dude. Why?

I'm playing Rey!
If you're playing Rey, I'm Luke and you got to give me a piggyback!