Saga How my disappointment with TLJ made me appreciate the 1-6 story

What about it? That the Sith were born out of dissident Jedi is not anyone's argument, it's a fact. That has nothing to do with what's being discussed, the Jedi or the Jedi way.

And how have they failed in their mission?

What are the failures of the Jedi and how have those failures dictated their decisions and way of life?

How?

Yoda acknowledges failure in defeating Sidious, not failure in the Jedi way.

The ultimate resolution of ROTJ is not to improve their ways, but to stick and being true to them. That's what Luke did.

The argument between Luke and Obi-wan/Yoda had nothing to do with the Jedi way or their teachings but wether or not Anakin could be saved or was completely lost to Sidious.

 

Their mission was to "guard peace and justice".

Peace came to an end in the Clone Wars, and Justice came to an end when the Emperor took over.

 

Exactly!

Windu: We are keepers, NOT soldiers..

Me: Than why did you take charge of the Army, without finishing your investigation?

of course that Kenobi got captured, and as Bail said, The Separatist were preparing for war..Padmè's capture didn't help matters.

But the Jedi IMO, did end up corrupting their- everything when the chose to defend the Republic in this way and paid dearly for it. I honestly hate the direction TCW took regarding this as they became suddenly the sole guilty party in all that happen, past season 3, second main reason why I stopped watching it, but having Planets question Jedi motives like in the Jedi Crash arc seems reasonable - how they handle Anakin from start to finish is questionable. Because of their complacency, they played right into Palps trap. No wonder he saw them as dogmatic and narrow.

 

The Jedi had fallen from their way and had ultimately failed to protect the galaxy. Arrogance and hubris led them into Sidious's trap and completely unable to break out of it, ultimately cumulating in their demise and Obi-Wan and Yoda seeking the apprenticeship of Qui-Gon, who knew too much dogmatic teaching had failed the Jedi. The Jedi thought they were following their way, but ultimately weren't, and fell because of it. Luke ultimately improved upon the one last thing Obi-Wan and Yoda had still not been able to overcome - too seek attachment to their friends goodness enough to be able to save it.

Luke's problem isn't that the Jedi way is wrong, it's that the Jedi way had failed to keep the Jedi protecting the galaxy and from people who followed it from straying, and had fallen short by that standard.

 

To keep peace and justice doesn't mean unrest or injustice can't take over. The Jedi did keep peace and justice until the very end. Their numbers were limited.

They were put in charge of the army by the Republic that they swore to serve so that they could do whatever they could to end the conflict as soon as possible. And finish what investigation?

What exactly were they supposed to do? Let the war go on, the Republic be attacked and stand by in the sidelines watching the show? Or help lead the army in the best manner possible in order to end the war and avoid causing more death and destruction. War is bad and nobody likes the war. But the war was a reality, wether they agree to be part of it or not.

The Jedi had not fallen from their way, they sticked to it, it defined who they are. They didn't act on anyone's arrogance or hubris. Sidious used deception from the beginning, and exploited the Republic's weaknesses to gain power. That's not a fault of the Jedi. The Jedi aren't omniscient nor are they meant to be. They did whatever they could with the knowledge they had.

That's a strawman. Qui-Gon having learned how to retain his spirit in the netherworld had nothing to do with any alleged dogmatism or lack thereof. He was able to learn it, and in turn teach it to the surviving Jedi.

I asked for examples to back your statements, you provided none.

Seek attachment to their friends?! When did that happen? How is seeking attachment, which is greed and self-centered, an improvement?

How has the Jedi way failed in any of that? The Jedi way is not at fault for those who chose not to follow it. That doesn't even make sense. It's a contradiction.

 

They had fallen from their way. Supported by Lucas's depiction of them in TCW. They engaged in a war they never should have taken such an active role in and the Council was too dogmatic and arrogant. Their mission statement is to preserve peace and justice and they failed. By any definition they failed to uphold that.

Qui-Gon was not dogmatic, contrasting that to the Councils almost unyielding dogmatic approach to things. That's why he was able to seek out new knowledge when they couldn't.

Obi-Wan and Yoda gave up completely on Anakin. Luke, through his attachment to that good self, was able to bring it out. Attachment is not all bad, but the Jedi feared it would give way too possessiveness that they didn't allow it outright.

The Jedi way is meant to preserve peace and justice in the galaxy. If it is unable to preserve that, and if people have fallen from it so readily, then it natrually it has failed.

Luke is focusing too much on the failure, but that doesn't mean the failure doesn't exist.

 

I myself had some issues with some of the things the Jedi did or acted on during the PT and to some extent the OT. However if Luke truly learned any lesson from that he would have used such knowledge to make the Jedi Order better. The idea that if the Jedi failed they should be dismantled is somewhat absurd, particularly since there is nothing similar or better to take their place. It’s like if a group of fire fighters failed to keep a house from burning down then that is a failure. The response should be to learn from that mistake and find ways to prevent that from happening again. It does not make sense that one would eliminate all fire fighters as a solution to that failure. And of course for the next house that is on fire it wouldn’t make sense to say having fire fighters will only make things worse and have those former fire fighters watch the house burn down without any action.

I mean that’s what Luke did. He said to end the Jedi because somehow they made things worse. So while the First Order and his old apprentice kills his best friend Han, about to kill his sister Leia, about to destroy the resistance and take over the galaxy, the solution is for him to die on island. How does that solve anything? If dying is the solution he should have just killed himself. Why survive on fish and...milk...when he should have just taken a lightsaber to himself? Or he can renounce the Jedi Order and his Force abilities and fight for his friends as average citizen Luke rather than Jedi Luke.

 

In fairness to Disney, incorporating the ST into the overall story was always going to be somewhat difficult because of the way Lucas chose to end the OT and the way he chose to make the prequels. If Im not mistaken, ROTJ ended up being sort of an amalgamation of what 7, 8, and 9 were originally going to be. And then he chose to make the PT as an inverse mirror of the OT, sort of like New vs. Old Testament, Illiad vs. Odyssey, Yin vs. Yang, etc. As a result, with the PT and the OT you had the same problem that you had with Terminator 1 and 2 and Alien and Aliens. The story of the first two was so complete that a third one just doesn't seem necessary.

But Disney decided not to follow Lucas's outline. It seems like they did everything possible to make it NOT fit into the overall story at all. My major beef is that the ST rehashes the OT so much that it actually creates a whole other backstory that rehashes the PT. But the OT should have been the backstory to the ST the way that the PT was the backstory to the OT. Because of that and the fact that the ST isn't being shot in the same way the first six were shot it indeed feels very tacked on.

 

I believe that’s correct that the original plan was to have Luke confront the emperor in episode 9 but obviously got condensed for him to do that in episode 6 instead. Lucas then rerouted his ideas for the ST to be about rebuilding a democracy. I’d imagine that even though that is intriguing to Lucas, Disney likely saw that as boring. Just like the PT is a story of how a democracy turns itself into a tyranny, it is intellectually fascinating but doesn’t have the same emotional weight as an underdog rebellion attempting to topple a tyrannical empire. So rather taking the theme of trying to rebuild a democracy as the main backdrop to the ST, while also being intellectually interesting, I’m sure Disney also felt that people wouldn’t find that story as gripping as the OT story. As such they rehashed the rebels vs. empire theme, slapped a different name on it and ignored whether such a reboot would make sense in the grand scheme of the saga as a whole.

Having said that I think they underestimated the story that could be told in a universe now is potentially in chaos. Order in the PT was controlled by the Old Republic and order in the OT was controlled by the Empire. In the ST, there could have been no order at all and had a post apocalyptic world of disorder where the scum of the universe now ruled and had new heroes rising to bring it back to civilization.

Lucas layers themes in individual context and expands them to larger entities. The choices between good and evil is seen by the choices made by characters, particularly Anakin and Luke. On a larger level it is seen how entire organizations or governments chooses to side with good or evil. In the same vine, we see that within the heroe’s journey, one undergoes a death and metamorphosis, rising from the ashes to be reborn as something greater. As such Anakin grows up in a world constructed and manipulated for him by the Jedi, the emperor, and his very own fears. As individuals we undergo a “death” so that we can rebuild upon our vision of the world of how we feel it ought to be rather than how we are told it’s supposed to be. The world we live in when we are young is house made of bricks that are put in place by other people. These are our manners, our values, our sense of right and wrong which are put in place by the people we know and meet. People must undego a metaphorical death where the world as we know it is destroyed and all the values and our belief of right and wrong come into question. Eventually we rebuild this world, but we choose what we value rather than being told what to value. And so that house of bricks is destroyed. And those same bricks that were placed by other people, we use to make our new house brick-by-brick but now in our own vision. And Anakin, who dies as Vader becomes reborn again and chooses to side with his son.

On a larger scale the Old Republic dies, and like a caterpillar becoming a cocoon, becomes the Empire just as Anakin became Vader. And from that cocoon hatches the butterfly, something better than what had existed before. That is this New Republic, a greater entity than previous, forged by the sacrifices of old and new heroes. I’m sorry but that doesn’t sound boring to me.

 

I think many of you guys are correct in that Lucas condensed Episode 7,8,9 to morphing into a basket for ROTJ. So it would have made more sense on a narrative scale to have Luke confront The Emperor in Episode 9 so everything could come full circle. Instead we get a new Empire, a new Emperor, a new Darth Vader in the Disney ST to compensate for that. We could have gotten Luke looking for the 'Other' in Episode 6, 7 or 8 (That was supposed to be his long lost sister, not Leia). She would be the one who would fight with him to end the Empire, instead we get Rey.

Maybe I was naive but I thought Disney could pull off 7,8,9 with a new narrative and it would seamlessly fit in the Saga because they had Luke, Leia and Han back. Hindsight is 20/20, but I don't think it will ever seamlessly be a Saga 1-9 like it was intended. But maybe when the Trilogy is done, there is some theme, some narrative, something JJ pulls off in Episode 9 that can tie the Saga together in one way or another so it feels like a continuous story?

I still feel that Disney would have been better off making a new Trilogy in 2015 about Rey, Finn, BB8, Poe and Kylo Ren that took place hundreds of years after the OT so they could be their own things. Yes, they would have sacrificed Box Office $$$ because many OT fans may have not cared without the return of Luke, Leia and Han. But I actually think those 3 characters handcuffed the storytelling in this Trilogy, and they potential for good characters arcs of Rey, Kylo Ren, etc, have been sacrificed because the fans are divided on Luke's arc. Heck, what are fans debating right now about Episode 9? Not Rey or Kylo Ren, they are debating whether Luke comes back as a Force Ghost or how they should play out Leia's death or recast her?

If Disney wanted to let the past die, they should have taken their own advice. It seems the past is the only thing they keep giving us.

 

Yeah, ROTJ ended in way that didn't make it possible for continuation.

I honestly don't understand what is the point of having the sequels (besides money of course) when they could have made just one movie to show what happened to Luke, Leia and Han as a nostalgia pandering or whatever. I'm actually looking forward to their movies after ST because they will have more freedom with them to do what they want and less expectations.

 

Not really.
-First of all, there is no "originally" here: the ideas were always evolving and changing, and virtually nothing was set in stone.
-When the "trilogy of trilogies" formula was more or less established (1978-1979), Lucas always said that the trilogy he was making at the time would be complete: the Empire and Vader would be dealt with in the third movie of the trilogy, which would finish the story of Luke, Han, Leia, the Rebels vs. the Empire....
-We can't be sure how much Lucas knew at the time about the ST, since he only talked about very broad ideas and topics, and he never specified the story or the characters (he only said that the robots would be the ONLY characters featuring in the three trilogies: the ST was clearly NOT about Luke, Han and Leia). Personally, I believe the never had any specific story developed.
-In any case, I don't see how ROTJ is an amalgamation of the ST: none of the storylines of ROTJ come from any future story. The movie has three very clear (and "obvious") sections: the ewoks helping the heroes destroy the Empire (one of his very original ideas for Star Wars), Luke confronting Vader and the Emperor (the natural climax of the personal conflict of the OT) and Han's rescue (which Lucas now admits was sort of tackled on because there was not much story left to tell, and he wanted to have a bit of fun with a more elaborate "cantina" sequence).

My point is, the ROTJ does feel totally conclusive, but not because it incorporates elements from any ST. There was no storyline created for a ST, or at least not any storyline that was a natural sequel to the OT (remember: Lucas talked about the three trilogies as three different stories, which may or may not be told).
The PT used ROTJ as a reference of where the story was supposed to end, and constructed the story backwards, telling the story of the "big bad villain" and the "redeemed hero" that featured in the climax of the OT, thus solidifying a unfied and cohesive narrative.

The PT and OT are two halves of a story: one is about the fall and the other is about the rise. There is no natural place for a "third half". The idea of " a trilogy of trilogies" sounds cool but doesn't really work in this case. That's why the ST (or any ST for that matter) feels like it's not part of the same story.

 

Not in the Jedi Way per say, but how the Jedi teachings are approached..I touched on this with you a bit on other threads. Yoda understood this, and because of this Luke succeeds by doing what's seemly impossible in the end.

They chose to become of an Army even when they knew that what made them owners of said army was highly suspicious..I understand that in the end, they were made to feel like they had no choise, but the condescending way Padmè's claims get dismissed, when she's in opposition to the MCA. The scrawl makes it clear that the Jedi knew that the Army was for them, so why NOT heed her claims in any capacity??? When killing her would ensure said army to be created? So the Jedi, seem unwilling to investigate (WHY? I really would like your take on this, because I have feeling that my reasoning will not be valid somehow to you) but Padmè insists:

P: I don't need more security, I need answers ...I want to know who's trying to kill me.
in the middle of his scolding Anakin says something that will prove true:
Why we be assigned to her if not to find her killer?

But Kenobi is focused on how Anakin is not so the ideal Jedi right now..He doesn't even consider what was just said.

That night what happened Padmè is attacked and what does it lead to...AN INVESTIGATION.
Unfortunately before they get to close Kenobi is captured, not before providing proof that the Army is needed. Great timing on Sidious's part I might add. The Jedi were there (for moral support according to the Novel) when Jar-Jar addressed the Senate!!

Be mindful for once...but then again, only Anakin was the only one was capable of attachment.
@Alexrd reply to me inThe Foibles and Flaws of the Jedi because I do not wish to derail this thread further.

I actually prayed for this to happen, but once JJ was announced as director I was like oh crap...the good thing about TFA is that it allowed me to see the Saga on the big screen, allowing me to experience how Lucas's work flows together, it was truly a privilege. The bad thing was that TFA stick out as a wart right after ROTJ...Haven't seen it since. I'll probably wait until TLJ is on Netflix to see it.

 

@La Calavera this is my thoughts as well. I've mentioned before that the PT was great ideas with bad execution. The ST is bad ideas with good execution. Sort of a yin-yang. With the OT being just right. It's like goldilocks and the three bears

I think one thing that would have helped to connect RotJ to the TFA better was to show the galaxy as peaceful, with a new democracy set up and everything. Then out of nowhere comes this new threat, which could have been Snoke or a new fleet of enemies. Then it would have made more sense to see how the OT cast ended up the way they did. Instead of seeing character progression from the original cast, we saw a retread of going to how we knew them and nothing else. We didn't get to see Han and Leia as these leaders or Luke training the new Jedi. We heard how all of them failed instead. I would have started TFA off with showing how Kylo Ren turned, followed by TFA that we got, or something along those lines. The only thing we really saw progression from RotJ was star destroyers in the sand.

But like some of you are saying, let's see how 9 ties all of this up.