ST Palpatine "Gran Palpa" Discussion Thread

Leia's retcon was used for maximum emotional drama and impact on our protagonist (and even antagonist). Can't say the same for Grandpa, which ultimately resulted in nothing.

 

Hmm. Not sure I agree. Care to elaborate?

 

Leia was used wisely and affectively for emotional gravity during the final battle. Palpatine had no affect whatsoever on Kylo or Rey's emotional struggle or battle. One was used creatively based on set up and cues established all throughout Luke's arc. The other a desperate choice by a writer who could have cared less about the character or future of the franchise based on his decisions and just needed 'something' to finish the movie because he never set anything up in the character he created in the first place.

 

Honestly you didn't need Leia to be Lukes sister to have the same Gravity. Luke can care about Leia without her being his sister. It could have been written many different ways and had the same gravity. If Vader had threatened his friends Han, Leia and chewy in that scene it could have had the same impact of Luke attacking Vader. Infact there would be very little change at all.

Overall Leia being Lukes sister could be considered very out of no where. Perhaps a little strange with the on the lips kisses they shared which were clearly meant to be more a sign of attraction on Leia part. And now its official canon that Leia and Luke are brother and sister because ROTJ made it canon. We just kinda have to ignore that this wasn't the plan and certain obvious signs that when Lucas did Episode 4 and 5, they were probably meant to be attracted to each other.

If this was done today in a Star Wars It would be a much bigger joke than it was in 1983. Lucas would be laughed at for his trying to convince the audience they are related now.

 

To clarify, do you think Sidious was brought back to life in his original body through a science based method?

I haven't read/watched the other stuff beyond the 9 episodes. But...what did they do? They made Rey's father a non Force sensitive and even though Rey is an ultra ultra Force sensitive?? I guess I shouldn't be judging without actually reading it, but holy moly that sounds lunatic to me.

 

The Leia reveal built on a protectiveness that Luke already felt toward her while redefining their relationship as non-romantic, giving closure to the love triangle with Han. It also added to Vader’s surviving family, which contributed to his redemption. So rather than her being just a friend for Vader to threaten, suddenly she became more significant to the characters and the plot.

The Palpatine reveal seemed more like an attempt to copy the Vader reveal, but there was no clear impact in my opinion. It makes Rey question whether she’s destined for the dark side, but outside of a few moments here and there, she never really seems like she’s tempted by the dark side at all, so it doesn’t come across as a realistic threat. So even if that’s what she’s meant to be going through, I don’t really buy it.

If the previous movies had done more to highlight dark-side tendencies—say by highlighting how her coming into her power so quickly was potentially due to the dark side rather than innate and untrained skill—then maybe that reveal would have more weight. But Rey was consistently kind-hearted and loyal to her friends. Even if she saw a vision of herself becoming evil, there’s no meaningful darkness in her that makes that seem like more than a misdirect. Especially when you throw in a somewhat confusing plot element about partial or full possession.

 

I think its a number of things with Rey and Palpatine. Her desire for answers to who she is and who her parents is a thread throughout all 3 movies. And she gets answers to them but its that she has a evil grandfather that killed your parents so he could find you. And then after she is getting visions of her turning to the dark side, Which there is no context for in her mind beyond this idea she is destined to be evil. So she then becomes worried that this will become reality.

Whether or not she did anything bad or not doesn't mean she will not worry about every move she makes validating that vision. And by the end, yeah its revealed its possession i guess, meaning that it wouldn't be Rey turning but more she is a vessel for palpatines return. Which obviously she didn't know. Now caught in a trap where she has very few options.

I mean thats not to say there was any plan. But lucas didn't always have a plan either, and sometimes you gotta acknowledge when things can still potentially line up in some way if you stop looking for problems

 

Though Leia as Luke's sister was (a somewhat sloppy) retcon, I agree that this was indeed leveraged in the throne room scene to have Luke come out of hiding a rage against Vader. "If you will not turn, then perhaps she will."

That said, I cannot agree that Leia's "was used creatively based on set up and cues established all throughout Luke's arc." Leia suddenly being Luke's sister actually goes directly against what we've seen established in the other films. Though we have long since been accustomed to Luke and Leia being twins, it was a watered down version of Vader being Luke's father....and a real hamfisted switch-a-roo.
Now, if you still prefer it to Palpatine's return and lineage as Rey's grandpa...fine. I get it. I do too. Yet, I don't think Leia's retcon was a lot more elgantly handled.

Futhermore, Palpatine most certainly had an effect on both Rey (and to some extent) Kylo Ren's emotional battle/struggle. If you don't like that this is a huge thematic piece of TROS...I get it, however it is a big part of a narrative thread. You seem to have a lot of disdain for the writers, but I cannot fault the late minute shift any more than I can fault Lucas for retconning the hell out his films/story.

Agree. Leia as Luke's sister is widely accepted now, but if you look at it objectively...it's fairly contrived, incongrous to what came before, and cringe inducing in some instances.

It seems like you are saying the end result is worth any hamfisted retconning that occured. That the emotional payoff is worth having Luke and Leia be romantic previously.

The question is: Is this the only way to end the love triangle? No. You could have had Luke talk to Leia on the Ewok bridge and simply tell her that he realizes she should be with Han. Like he has to focus being a Jedi, etc.

Also, as you said...and @Daxon101 mentions...Luke is already incredibly protective of Leia. We saw this when he left his ESB training to save them. Vader goading Luke over Leia did not require a blood relation for Luke to lose his ****.

The Last Jedi does this. Luke mentions this and actually fears this. Rey has a tendency to go right to the dark side right off the bat.

 

The Leia retcon wasn’t the only way to resolve things, no. But it worked out mostly okay and fit well enough into the “finished” story that ROTJ concluded. As we know, ROTJ was itself a compressed version of the story Lucas had at one point intended to tell. So it was probably never going to be perfect. But the decisions he ended up making for it, clumsy as they may have been, did mostly work for me. Again, I was a kid when I first watched it, so I’m not discounting the influence of that in my impression.

With the Palpatine retcon for Rey, I have only ever rewatched TROS with the intention of appreciating it better. And I’ve rewatched it quite a bit. My reaction is not as negative as it was when I first watched it, but I can’t honestly say that I’m converted to being a fan of it. It still feels quite clumsy and doesn’t have the emotional impact that I imagine it should. But I have gradually come to enjoy it more, I’ll give it that.

I do get the sense that there was more to Rey and Palpatine and Exegol that didn’t make it into the final cut that would’ve made those final scenes of the movie coalesce better for me. Like, why would she be OK with his spirit going into her? Did she have a reason to believe she would still be in control? Possibly, but the movie glosses over this and that’s not cool in my book. I love theorizing, but I also want the movie itself to provide something solid that I can base my theories on. And Exegol feels like it’s full of gaps where something could’ve helped make things jell better but was removed in the end.

 

I feel the same. ROTJ hit me as a kid so I was very open/forgiving/less critical and discerning. As I said, it's my favorite movie. That said, many of the flaws people lob at TROS can be lobbed at ROTJ too....in fact....some fans back in '83 did have some similar criticisms.

 

You seem to have this view point that lucasfilm and JJ are at odds with each other. Lucasfilm is like MORE KYLO! and poor reluctant JJ is trying to find ways to not keep it about Rey while being sad that he can't keep Kylo a bad guy. Thats really silly and likely isn't the case at all. Not everything is a conspiracy.

As for Exegol there were leaks at the time that said a lot of exposition that was removed because they didnt trust the audience wouldnt get bored.

 

Don't get me started on how ROTJ fails Han and Leia and especially turns Han back into the guy from ANH not ESB or we'll be here all night...I absolutely had similar criticisms then. But after not seeing ROTJ since the 80s, I saw it again (despecialized edition) after TFA and TLJ and the difference is striking. ROTJ makes sense. The pacing is spot on and the battles are cut so that you can figure out what's going on. Now, I still say that Lucas got damn luck with the Luke & Leia reveal and frankly, it wasn't needed at all. I still also don't believe Luke would fall to the Dark Side, but that's because I know those characters after three movies. Luke's journey propels the movie, through Han's rescue to the Death Star 2.

TROS is a mess. There isn't a moment when a scene is left to breathe, and at the same time, it's boring as all hell. I mean, that's an achievement. I don't know how telling us anything about Exegol would slow down the plot any more than the scene of finding out that Poe had a past as Dime Store Han Solo with JJ's pal Keri Russell in a helmet.

 

The whole Palpatine and Rey relation was such a bad joke, but then it wasn't even decided on while they were filming, hence why the final confrontation feels so generic good vs evil rather than a family matter like it was with Luke and Vader. Swap out a few lines, and they're not even related anymore. I mean, Luke finds out about his father and mulls over it for months, to try to come to terms with it and what it means for himself and what he thought he knew. Rey finds out and then is over it (it actually reinforces her love for her parents, finding out why they left her on Jakku), she doesn't even have any hate for Palpatine, all in less than 16 hours.

Even Rey's Force lightning mistake was undone so quickly, I didn't want them to kill Chewie, but his death could at least have served as a reminder to Rey to be more careful, but instead she never even messes up at all. Nor does any of her friends help her in her big moment, she pushes them all away. Then there's how her win comes from asking a bunch of strangers for help rather than actually having a conversation with her supposed friends. Even the ending of the trilogy shows how few bonds she actually has, standing there by herself on Tatooine rather than the big group shot RotJ ended on.

Partially that's due to Abrams being Abrams but such stupidity was fine with Disney as well, Palpatine was mainly there to be a convenient excuse to let Kylo off the hook and to serve as the big bad, can't make Kylo look bad after all. Its why I'll give Abrams a bit of leeway with TRoS, a lot of it is his fault but he also had to come up with a new big bad and come up with a plot for Rey and Kylo after TLJ left things at a dead end (Kylo as the big bad and only alive thanks to special treatment from Rey) and unfortunately Palpatine was the obvious lazy answer as a replacement.

 

And whose to say he felt it was toxic? Whose to say he wasn't fully onboard with it?

Thats certainly an assumption.

One of the things JJ brought up in interviews is that he is very much a tv show director. He will come on board and direct an episode and then come back 6 episodes later and direct another. He is used to jumping on board and continuing a story in whatever way he feels is the best way possible.

I mean its true what you say, he is a team player for the studios. But a team player doesn't mean he also has a strong vision that was taken away from him.

That sounds more like something you wanted rather than something that might have made sense at the time

I don't know how it screws over Finn unless you believe he was going to be treated different because of that

We had the version where Kylo was the main bad, it was called Duel of the Fates. And he was still redeemed to a point in a very similar way to TROS. Reason why it likely didn't get made is because it probably wasn't seen as a bit enough. They wanted Thanos. Kylo wasn't Thanos. He wasn't a villain we seen over all 9 of the movies. If you take out this conspiracy theory and think about it from that perspective... it does make sense what they were doing here.

That is a false misconception though. Because Ben Solo being the villain means that we are going to be more invested in how his story ends. Because him being a Skywalkers creates this question of whether we will see good in him. Whether he will be redeemed like his grandfather. And while some people complained they didn't want to see a redo of Vader, for the most part, you would want to believe any Skywalker as good in them. Especially children of Han and Leia. Why anyone wouldn't want to believe that is beyond me. Whether its bitter sweet or not, its very much Star Wars that bad stuff happens before the good.

Rey being a Skywalker wouldn't have reduce Ben Solo to be expendable. He would always be something you would have to treat in a very sensitive way because he is the son of Han and Leia, and thats likely what they realised one they got passed this desire for Vader 2.0

 

I don't believe that. Not for a hot minute. It started with the whole "your father Han Solo" nonsense and careened downhill from there.

I don't want to believe any Skywalker has good in them. They have to give me a reason to believe that, not just their last name. The second he murdered Han, Kylo was completely done to me. I was already yelling at Leia in my head when she was sending Han to go get him (and let me talk about the character assassination of that) because, sorry, he had no redeeming qualities and I don't care to watch yet another Skywalker screw things up. He doesn't have any good in him. Even worse, he's bad because things didn't go his way. He wasn't born a slave, or ripped from his mother who dies in captivity (another great move from the Jedi there), or sent into a war, which attempts to explain Anakin. We don't know why he turned dark. We still don't. Oh, the Emperor talked in his head. Sure, fine, whatever.

I didn't care about Vader's redemption except because Luke cared. That's it. So Kylo kills Han? Go take a swan dive into a lake of lava and be all the way like Gramps, you whiny emo jackass.

The vast audience who don't think that Driver is some kind of great actor or good looking or somehow decided that Kylo is really "Ben Solo" and needs to be fixed, we don't care! We want him dead. He's Han and Leia's child? Okay, then if he cared a miligram about Han and Leia, he wouldn't have murdered his father and almost killed his mother and tried to kill his uncle and destroyed everything they worked for. I still cannot believe that LFL did not get this. He destroyed everything and we still want him redeemed? No. Why?

Instead, LFL decides Kylo just needs, what, Rey who knows nothing about him but she's a woman so hey, let's make the female lead Jedi's whole deal to be Kylo's redemption. Because they wanted their Vader and Anakin in one. Because of this increasingly overwhelming "let's explain the villain and let's save him so we can have him be the villain anti hero again in the next movie" trend.

Then at the very last moment, they realize they need another Skywalker, they turn Palps' granddaughter, into a Skywalker. But really, the whole nihilism of the ST is perfectly expressed by having Palps win the day.

 

I notice you tend to make out that you can't like kylo unless you hate everyone else. And thats probably a view point you are creating for yourself. It would be like saying you can't be a fan of anakin unless you hate the Jedi since he does kill most of those characters. Which is not true at all. But either way. Obviously legacy is important so you do need to take the journey from the PT to the ST. they tried to avoid that with TFA because they really thought the PT would hurt the Star Wars, but it caught up with them once they actually had to start taking connection seriously. Even though they still very much liked the idea of a hero whose not a Skywalker. JJ himself has spoken about this. That they felt a Palpatine was different enough to not go down that Skywalker route.

As for Ben Solo. Children are basically an extension of their parents. So yeah you look for those types of connections. Its just how it is. thats normal media stuff to expect a piece of your parents in your child. Which creates the question of whether you would see it in Ben Solo. And when the answer isn't there you keep your mind open that you could infact see it. Just like Luke and Anakin, they share traits being father and Son. Lucas made that fairly clear whenever he could. Even though Anakin did alot of bad things.

 

RotJ is not a perfect movie, and I tend to be more forgiving of all of its many, many flaws because I was a kid when I first saw it and it was by far my favorite SW film for the exact same reason it is now much lower on my list of Star Wars films.

There are certain criticisms that I recognize now as an adult that never would have entered my mind as a kid.

I loved the ewoks, I loved the second Death Star because it was like the first only cooler. I liked the monsters and Jabba’s Palace.

Anything repetitive about it or juvenile about it I didn’t recognize at the time.

The ST came out when I was an adult though, so I am a lot more cognizant of lazy writing (what kind of 10 -13 year old would criticize such a thing?)

I accepted Vader’s redemption because I was supposed to, because Luke cared about it. This guy cut off Luke’s hand, murdered subordinates, tortured his daughter and was complicit in the destruction of her world and was standing by and watching the destruction of Luke’s friends. Yet when he kills the Emperor everything is fine.

George did ultimately go back and show us why Vader fell, which made him more sympathetic, that Palpatine was manipulating him for years and he was convinced there was a power to save his wife from death that the Jedi were withholding from him due to lack of trust.

But with Kylo, why did he turn? Why is he compelled to kill Han? Vader was at least conflicted because he did not want to kill Luke and instead was trying to bring him over to the Sith POV, but Kylo just feels like he needs to kill Han.

And I wanted to know more about how Snoke fit into everything, but we got nothing.

And Pablo on Twitter could correctly point out that we had no idea why Vader turned and knew almost nothing about Palpatine before 1999, but that audience is much older now and I don’t think it’s enough to just make a movie to mine nostalgia and have the “whataboutisms” regarding how what worked in the 70s and 80s should be able to work in the 2010s with the most minor of changes.

Palpatine coming back was not something I hated. He’s actually my favorite character and I love Ian’s performances. I thought having him already be back and having been behind everything this whole time was lame. And I thought establishing that Luke and Leia pretty much knew who Rey was retroactively was dumb.

I thought Palpatine getting brought back in the last installment and retroactively being established as tied to Rey’s origin was incredibly lame (“but what about ESB?!”).

I think the defense of these criticisms is really telling that there was a horrible lack of originality in the ST. As much as I dislike TLJ, I do think that movie deserves credit for trying to be original. People might dislike it for subverting expectations, or for me it was how much it went out of its way to do so. But TFA and RoS seem like JJ was looking at the OT as a recipe book for how to make a Star Wars movie.

 

The reasons why Vader turned were enough (he's plotting to take over in ESB, and then the love of his son, and realizing that he's still Anakin, and that he cannot let someone murder his own flesh and blood).

And Palpatine was set up in ANH, right from the very beginning, to be the Big Bad. We don't need to know exactly how he's amassed this power (dark side or political) because he and the Empire are the status quo. We're told that he took over and killed all the Jedi and that he seduced Vader to help him. And he clearly wants a younger apprentice since his current attack dog is an old, chopped up, asthmatic, cyborg.

However, nothing is given to us in the ST about Kylo and Snoke. And knowing their back history and motivations are vital since these episodes follow what we saw take place in EP 6. The new status quo is never told to us. The creators of the ST wanted that "dumped in the middle of a story" charm that Lucas brought to Star Wars but didn't quite realize that you can't just do that willy nilly.

 

One thing that I wonder about Palpatine in TROS is how much of his story was recycled from what Abrams had originally considered doing with Snoke. It’s possible Palpatine’s storyline was completely newly developed when he was brought back. But there’s also things that seem like they could’ve been originally thought of for Snoke.

Exegol, for example, seems like a more fitting home base for the Snoke we saw briefly in TFA. The color and lighting used in the throne room on Starkiller Base is very similar to what we later saw in Exegol. And Snoke’s stone seat is much more in line with the designs of the Sith Citadel in TROS than with the Supremacy in TLJ.

Another similarity is the whole contrast between Snoke’s relative physical weakness and his strength in the Force. This was mentioned a few times in the press tour for TFA, but I can’t say that it really came into play in TLJ. But then in TROS we see a physically weakened Palpatine whose weakened state is a specific driver in his overall motivations for that movie. Though these motivations are admittedly a bit hard to parse, both relate to him having his power restored one way or another, whether through possession of a younger Force wielder or through absorbing the power of the Dyad. So were some of these ideas originally part of Snoke’s aborted storyline as the big bad of the trilogy, or were they only developed once Palpatine was back in the story?

Honestly, I wonder if even the cloning element may have originally been part of Snoke’s storyline. Abrams kept comparing the First Order in TFA to Nazis in Argentina post-WW2, which I think made many fans wonder whether there was going to be some kind of allusion to The Boys from Brazil. By the time TROS came out, this connection to Argentinian Nazis was being used again but this time for the Final Order, suggesting that at least some of what we see in Exegol could have been meant to be what Abrams wanted for the First Order’s origin and home base rather than the purely mobile fleet Johnson gave us in TLJ. So perhaps cloning was involved even then, and I could even imagine Snoke being the result of plans to clone Palpatine (as he ended up being), though still being the big bad if Palpatine himself had never been brought back, so more in line with C’baoth in the Thrawn trilogy.

 

It's not? The opening crawl establishes this fairly well.

Luke Skywalker has vanished. In his absence, the sinister FIRST ORDER has risen from the ashes of the Empire and will not rest until Skywalker, the last Jedi, has been destroyed.

With the support of the REPUBLIC, General Leia Organa leads a brave RESISTANCE. She is desperate to find her brother Luke and gain his help in restoring peace and justice to the galaxy.

Leia has sent her most daring pilot on a secret mission to Jakku, where an old ally has discovered a clue to Luke’s whereabouts….


This seems like setting up/telling us the status quo right here. Compare it to the Episode 4 or Episode 1 opening crawls...

 

I don't see the words "Kylo" or "Snoke" in those sentences. Also, kinda funny that Leia is so all fired to get Luke back but not Han or her son she supposedly will risk the mission for.

Also, the crawl should set up the plot. Do we see anything about Starkiller Base or Snoke in this nonsense? Not that I remember. Based on this crawl, the plot should revolve around finding Luke, not blowing up Death Star 3.