ST J.J. Abrams (Director Of TFA & TROS) Discussion Thread—Now Finally Discussing: JJ Abrams

I'm wondering that if they were going to do separate directors that they should have had each film more or less be stand alone despite telling their own stories.


Make TFA more of a standalone film that while yes introduced these characters told a full story from beginning middle and end no cliffhangers no nothing.

That's why I like TLJ it stands on it's own more or less and tells a full story. You don't need a sequel or honestly really need to see the previous one.

I mean if franchises like Mission Impossible and Fast and Furious do it, why not Star Wars

 

Because the Skywalker Saga wasn't designed to be three, six or nine separate stories. It was designed to be one story divided into sections (trilogies) and subsections (episodes).
Now, you can do that and make each episode work as a standalone film at the same time, but you'll need to know where the story is headed to pull it off.
Some of us might feel that RJ did pull that off, but I'll disagree. In my view, TLJ disrupted the narrative flow and killed its momentum.

I also feel that JJ could've handled the situation much better with his EpIX.

 

I don't believe Harrison Ford only signed up to TFA on the proviso that the character be killed off. Ford isn't that much of an arse and, given Ford's CV, I'm pretty sure he'd have been willing to appear in several Han Solo related films/appearances, assuming he thought the character was written well enough. Also, I don't believe the ST characters will ever by iconic, culturally or within SW fandom itself (perhaps Kylo Ren's lightsaber and BB8???), because I don't believe they are that engaging enough. Time will tell.

 

No I don't think they will be either and I don't think bb 8 will ever replace R2 in my opinion. As for Ford being an arse he wouldn't have been. He has a right to say I will or I won't come back. As a man of his age running around looks a tad foolish in the same way him doing Indians Jones stuff at his age looks a tad foolish too. In 1983 after jedi he was delighted to say goodbye to the solo garb and for years wouldn't realky talk about it.

I think the plan with the trilogy was to kill of each major ot character in each film. Solo died in TFA luke in tlj and leia in ROS.

 

I think Ford would have always been happy to reprise his role as Han Solo, assuming it wasn't 'too' silly. When he wanted out of Star Wars during the 80's, he was in a completely different place, professionally, and wanted to do other things (as did Lucas, Fisher and Hamill)... I certainly can't blame them for that. Now, I'm pretty sure he'd do much anything he considered to be 'fun' or worthwhile to him personally i.e. I don't believe he's an acting snob, and I certainly don't believe he only agreed to reprise his role in TFA on the principle that Solo would be killed off.

 

Killing off Han was Abrams' and Kasdan's choice. They felt that it was the right move for the story they were telling, especially in regards to Kylo Ren.
A couple of quotes from JJ:

Read more here: https://ew.com/article/2015/12/21/jj-abrams-kylo-ren-shocking-act-star-wars-force-awakens/

 

I would argue that if they wanted the ST to have "guts" then Ben Solo would have lived at the end being unable to save Rey. She would have stayed dead and he would have to live with his choices without getting the easy out. (And I like Rey more than Kylo/Ben for the record)

 

I tend to agree with that. The scene where Ben crawls up to Rey's body and holds her with that look on his face... Wow. Imagine that being the end of Rey's journey and Ben having to, as you say, live with his choices and what they led to.
Probably too dark for JJ's/LFL's/Disney's taste, but I could see the movie ending with Ben exiling himself while Rey is celebrated for giving her life to save the galaxy.

Of course, that begs the question: Who would then carry on the legacy of the Jedi?
Well, maybe that would have to be Ben. Maybe that would be his way of atoning for his sins. There'd have to be time for the movie to address that, though. Have him face Finn and the others, somehow survive the encounter and then be acknowledged as the only hope for the Jedi.

 

Yeah, I keep reading daily reminders that Adam Driver kicked GIA's puppy (short summary of the overlong posts about his being KK favorite and Rian's mancrush and thus ruining ST) but if he indeed was such a fave and mancrush than why didn't they keep his character alive? Instead he died and Rose lives and therefore has an open door for future appearances that's closed to him (outside of All Jedi voice appearance or FG at best). So is Kelly Tran the new favorite now? Something doesn't compute. I mean, both you who like Rey more and GIA who proposed an excellent Ben Snow on Ice Planet exile sound more like how an actual favorite character would be treated by TPTB than how they treated him in the end. Dead so no future content unlike characters supposedly out of favor who still have that option open.

 

Who is GIA?

 

I just want to point out that TROS proved we can throw the myth of Abrams filming in order out of the window. And not take his freidn's word for granted either. Parts of Kefir Beer were filmed in August (first month of filming) even though it was second act. First act's opening (Kylo on Mustafar) was filmed in the fall. Pasana that was also act 1 was filmed in from late October to early November. So myth is busted.

 

Yeah baby! I would have loved this ending. (I was hoping for Dark Rey and Kylo going for it with a new Empire, but her death would have awesome)

 

There's another possibility. TPM Anakin (Jake Lloyd) came before ROTJ Anakin (Sebastian Shaw). TPM>ROTJ. But in fact he came after. 1983>1999. You only have to change Shaw from Adam Driver and 1983 for 2019. As for 1999, well...

Reincarnation. Already in these films Rey is Leia, the jedi Leia that never was, and both characters share the same jedi steps. It's not that big of a jump, concept-wise. Also, C3PO and his arc of self sacrifice and resurrection and amnesia are maybe there for a reason. The afterlife as more life.

JJ's Regarding Henry works at that 'fresh start' level, with bad and then good (but amnesiac) Harrison Ford in it.

It would also be a way of going forwards and backwards at the same time. Making TPM a part of TFA, so to speak. There's this weird line in the Kylo Ren comic, 'Obi-Wan Kenobi[...]everybody thinks I'm supposed to be him', and maybe those were Ben Solo's jedi steps, and they were frustrated - just like those of Leia.

Leia was never dead in TROS; she was alive and then her FG appeared. But between these two states, she was 'gone', as Han calls it. That sheet over her. So I guess Ben Solo is gone from 'there', in some kind of limbo slumber, but not already 'here'. That place 'where dreams are born' the kid from A.I. goes with her mom at the end - dreams are born in the writers' room.

 

They are dead. The property is devalued so they have no incentive to give anyone who died a reprieve in the future. They'll try to develop brand new characters starting with Waititi movie and I honestly doubt that they'll feature surviving ST characters much in ancillary sources. They know there isn't money in these characters, no point of trying to rehabilitate them. They might try to rehabilitate Rey only but that requires distance (few years when negative passions cool off) and patience (it may not have immediate result but need longer period to catch on like how TCW rehabilitated PT over a span over many years).

 

I can't blame Daniels for falling asleep... but saying that, I wouldn't trust his opinion on anything...

 

Yeah - I've met him a couple of times too... and he's very personable, but he can be quite catty about other people, and you get a sense of everything being about him... in the nicest possible way...

 

When you read the story you soon realise its a headline looking to stir something up.

 

He's not wrong. All the way to Kef Beer, the movie was as exciting as watching other people play Treasure Hunt game. It didn't have cinematic quality at all, just a bunch of shouty characters explaining to each other that they had to go get X and then Y and then Z. I don't blame him.

 

Yeah, C3PO fell 'deeply, deeply asleep' in TROS. This is him as C3PO from Feb.2019:

'Will this [agony] never end' is in the film, and so was the reboot. One can play this almost nonsense in the key of C3PO, but also in a human key: since they are robots, all of them. That's what characters are: robots, shadows, puppets.

Just after the 'agony' line, C3PO says: 'is this the afterlife? Are droids allowed here?' What happens to C3PO during TROS (death, resurrection, amnesia) is called reincarnation in other contexts. Contexts in which the word reboot is not used. Not a very spirirtual word.

'Afterlife' is. Leia was under a sheet, 'gone', before disappearing and reappearing. Is Ben Solo, bad robot, covered with a sheet on the other side by a Bad Robot guy from above? Already gone from 'there'?
An amnesiac C3PO reboots to a previous version during the film...and Anakin/Sebastian Shaw (1983) was reincarnated -amnesiac and purified- in Anakin/Jake Lloyd (1999).

Who is the afterlife's Babu Frik? That 'the One' who got it in the end looks like C3PO's 'the maker!'