ST Mark Hamill (Luke Skywalker) in the ST

Even though I share @The_Phantom_Calamari 's opinion on the matter, thanks for your view on it @Blame_It_On_Lucas .

That's the problem with the ST...we're all right, and we're all wrong.

I just want to reconcile my own misgivings somehow. But I'm pretty sure, for me anyway, that after TROS, I'm out.

 

Ok I just saw your edit and that does a lot better job providing context than your initial reply. At first it sounded condescending as if I don't know that a Greek tragedy was. Which I was like yeah a tragedy is a theatrical genre of Greek myth, so we're not saying anything different. But yeah your added paragraph made a lot more sense to what you were trying to say.

Again your perspective is understandable. I get that. I'm not trying to change your opinion here btw. For me I never saw Luke's "failure" as something that compromised what he did for Vader or for the galaxy when he was younger. In fact I still don't believe Luke failed anybody really.

Thanks for your reply. Yea and I think most posters here have articulated well their issues, and I don't presume to think I know better just because I don't share the same opinion. Like you said, we're all right and we're all wrong, totally agree with that.

And hey, sorry to hear that you'll be likely out after Episode IX. I mean hey I feel you. It's funny, and legit not expecting that you'll have a similar experience, but what you said gave me serious flashbacks to 2002 after Attack of the Clones. I remember after that movie I said to myself, I'm just going to see Episode III through, then that's it. Obviously I'm still here which is a reflection of how happy I was with ROTS, but yea I mean lets see this last one out - and at best hope to see you contribute to the forum after. A month and a half more . . .

 

I have absolutely no problem with you trying to change my opinion.

 

Lol, then I will need the aid of liquor my friend. Don't know I'm articulate enough to "Johnnie Cochran" the jury on this matter.

 

Han and Luke were denigrated, in my opinion, because all of the growth they made in the OT was thrown out and ignored. Han went back to being a cynical smuggler ( and a poor one at that), and he and leia were split apart. The wisdom that they should have gained in thirty more years was non-existent. Luke was making the same mistakes he made as a teenager, even though he had already learned from those mistakes by the end of RotJ.

Luke’s denigration was complete. His personality was completely changed, and his core traits that made him the wonderful character he was in the OT, were completely gone. He no longer showed compassion or kindness or love for his family or belief that it was never too late for anyone. He was always an action-oriented character; when the going got tough, he got going. He was courageous, and always ready and willing to help others, especially his friends and family. He was optimistic and never gave up. He was honest and had great integrity. The filmmakers of TLJ, didn’t change or take away a little of what made luke Luke. They took EVERYTHING away. If that’s not denigrating a character , I don’t know what is.

But the filmmakers weren’t even content with that. They took away prior accomplishments and according to their “ story”, Luke actually accomplished nothing else after he was 23 years old. He never successfully trained a single jedi; not one. Since that was the commission that yoda gave to Luke, that denigrated the character.

Then, they humiliated the character by having him milk that creature and drink it in the most disgusting way possible. That STILL wasn’t enough humiliation for them. They then had new force user Rey DEFEAT this supposed jedi master in a skirmish, leaving him to lie in the wet mud. How is that NOT denigration of the character? But again, there was yet another hit. They had Yoda come back to ‘ school” 53 year old Luke skywalker like he was a stupid kid who had never learned anything, in a really dumb way, talking about “ failure being the best teacher”. Yet, did the filmmakers allow Luke to show that he had learned from his mistakes by allowing him to train Rey and rebuild the jedi order he had lost? No, they did not. They killed him off in a ridiculous manner. He died from using the force. Makes a lot of sense for the son of the chosen one, who had the same force potential as his father, to die from using the Force, doesn’t it? And he died alone and unmourned.

Even worse, Luke was made to be an almost villain, going into his nephew’s room to read his mind, just like his villainous nephew did to Rey and Poe. Plus, RJ wants the audience to believe that Luke actually partially caused kylo’s fall. Again, this is denigrating the former hero of the OT, even taking away his integrity and moral code of conduct.

Sorry, but I definitely disagree that Luke wasn’t denigrated. He certainly was, and so was Han, to a slightly less degree. At least Han didn’t end up lying in the mud, defeated by a newbie, and didn’t help “ create” kylo.

 

@Blame_It_On_Lucas That's an interesting take, comparing the Saga to Greek Tragedy. It seems the first two trilogies could be classified as tragedy (the PT), followed by fairy tale (the OT). With that formula, you get a story of redemption. What went wrong in Act I has been set right in Act II. Adding an Act III onto what felt like a complete story was always a risk and, so far the effect of the final act appears to transform the entire story into tragedy... because I don't know about anyone else, but even if Rey succeeds in bringing the Jedi back and the Resistance succeeds in bringing the Republic back both victories will feel doomed to failure because of what has happened previously in the story.

@fugacity Regarding the idea that a new trilogy set hundreds of years in the future wouldn't be part of the Saga... that's a good point and it might have been a good thing. If Disney/Lucasfilm wanted to do a soft reboot, I wish they would have gone all the way instead of trying to soft reboot the franchise and finish a Saga that already feels finished at the same time. Instead of these movies being Episodes VII, VIII, and IX (which they weren't marketed as anyway), they should have created a brand new series and essentially started from scratch. Have a Skywalker descendant if you wish and include all of the echoes and Force ghosts you want to for nostalgia value, but place it in a different era.

 

I found Luke's negative behavior in "The Last Jedi" very implausible and out of character. I'm not one of those old SW fans who find the idea of Luke behaving in a negative manner implausible. I just found his negative behavior in "The Last Jedi" hard to believe.

I don't think he would have consider killing his nephew in that manner. Luke is not Obi-Wan Kenobi, who would consider committing a terrible act for the greater good. I don't think that is in his character. I think Luke would have confronted Ben Solo about what he had sensed first. However, Luke has always struck me as the type who would commit a terrible deed in the heat of the moment or when his emotional button had been pushed. I recall that in "A New Hope", he had simply lost his temper and started shooting at stormtroopers in a fit of rage after he had witnessed Obi-Wan's death. This same trait had manifested in "Return of the Jedi" when Anakin had sensed Leia's existence in his thoughts and threatened to turn her. Once again, Luke lost his temper in a fit of rage and fear, and nearly killed his father. Although he managed to hold himself back in the 1983 movie, I have always considered it plausible for Luke to be pushed into that kind of rage again. I believe it was a part of his personality makeup, something that would take a lifetime for him to overcome.

But that never happened in "The Last Jedi". And what made his behavior in that film even more hard to believe is that even though Rey had pointed out that Leia, of all people, was in danger by the First Order; Luke had refused to leave Ach-to. Regardless of any guilt or personal disenchantment he may have felt over his nephew, I really find it hard to believe that Luke would be reluctant to help Leia, especially after learning about Han's death. That dog just didn't hunt. At least to me.

 

Like behaving in a negative manner isn't hard to buy nor is it a problem necessarily. BUT, how he acted HERE, well that's the problem, and that's what's not believable imo.

Give him flaws, by all means.. HOWEVER, make them flaws that fit with the progression that he's had, it shouldn't be that hard.

 

The progression we've seen, or the progression of three decades that we have no real knowledge of?

 

Time for another trilogy to explain!!

 

I think the bigger issue in this case, compared to say ROTJ, is that rage isn't really motivating Luke in his decisions here. It's fear. Fear is the first thing a Jedi has to learn to master and while it is something that you struggle with your entire life, you don't make the rank of Master by buckling under it at the first sign of bad dreams. That's a padawan's error. This again goes back to the lesson of the cave, which Luke went through in Empire and understood by the end of Jedi, that what feelings we bring with us in a given situation is what will determine our reality. If Luke is going around trying to Yoda things up, then he should have basic control over his emotions. Furthermore, he should recognize what he's seeing in Ben's mind is not set in stone and that the future is malleable and subject to change. Luke's next step as a Jedi Master needed to be instruction, empathy and reconciliation, working with his pupil to help him overcome his dark impulses. This isn't the same situation as in Jedi, where Luke is up against 2 Sith, who are attacking him physically and emotionally, so his blood his up and he allows aggression to slip in. This is a Jedi Master, in his temple, with his students, at peace and in training. Luke committing these egregious blunders is inexcusable from a story standpoint, because he's showing himself to be completely unworthy of his designation of Master and teacher and from a standpoint of also ignoring the other chapter of the story we just came from, where supposedly he learned to be mindful and not make such mistakes, but oops!!! guess not.

 

Do you guys think if Luke was in character in TLJ, TLJ wouldn't have so much backlash? Or do you think the backlash was inevitable?

 

That's a rough "what if"...how do you make him more in character without rewriting the bulk of TLJ's script? If you were to write him as more of a Yoda or Obi Wan, wouldn't that lead to even more complaints about it being a "rehash" of ESB and ROTJ? And what about those fans that think he was perfectly in character as written?

It's an interesting conundrum. I think the question can be answered with another question: Would fans that are all right with the current take be just as ok with a more traditional "hero" take as well?

The backlash has many facets to it -- I think Luke seeming out of character is only one of many problems with the storytelling choices of TLJ though.

 

Oh yeah I agree, Luke out of character isn't the only problem with TLJ. It's just such a lackluster Star Wars film.

 

It's really hard to answer that, both because I don't know what the details of Luke being "in character" would look like and how it would affect the overall plot of TLJ and because audience reactions are subjective. Some have issues with the details of how Luke was portrayed as a depressed recluse and these fans probably could have been pacified with some changes in execution. However, other fans objected to the very premise of Luke being a depressed recluse and the only thing that would have pacified them would be a totally different plot.

Assuming that the portrayal of Luke satisfied all fans though, I think there are other things to object to. The heavy-handedness and overall pointlessness of Canto Bight subplot, Holdo withholding the plan from Poe for no good reason, Yoda acting out of character etc. I would have personally probably given my other issues with the movies a pass if I had been satisfied with the portrayal of Luke Skywalker. Even if it ended up being my least favourite of the Saga, I doubt I would have disliked it so passionately. I suspect the backlash would still exist, but it would be considerably smaller and not as persistent. At the end of the day, who cares about the exploits at Canto Bight? But we all care about Luke Skywalker and his portrayal in TLJ casts a shadow over the entire franchise for a lot of us.

 

Maybe it wouldn't have been quite the critical darling, while perhaps instead maintaining a higher audience rating, though as others here have said, there's plenty wrong with TLJ as just a film by itself without even mentioning Luke Skywalker. A lot of strange plot choices that lead to dead ends, editing issues that once you see them, you can't ignore them, the overabundance of meta commentary being injected into what really only works as a played straight epic story of more earnest telling that suffers from trying to support a form of writing and criticism that it was never intended to address. TLJ would almost certainly have ended up becoming 'someone else's story' a la the Shining under Kubrick. I don't even know if you could have convinced Johnson to stay aboard if you really took the red pen to his script.

 

Do you believe TLJ was dead on arrival?

 

I mean, with what we know now, I think TLJ wasn't really DOA, it was just a completely different kind of movie that just happened to get widespread notice because it carried the Star Wars brand with it. Much like how Joker 2019 is essentially Taxi Driver with a comic book coat of paint written for 2019, I would argue that TLJ was basically Apocalypse Now meets Star Wars. And much like AN presented a very different kind of war movie (more reflective, cynical and extremely grim) than what was seen prior to it, TLJ is a different kind of Wars film. It's very critical and self aware in the way that people who weren't die hard fans didn't know Star Wars could be, instead having written it off as something for kids or something they enjoyed as teenagers and so, to have this kind of 'adult' (and I use that term loosely here, as I don't think it makes SW any better if you slap the 'grown up' sticker on it) look at the lore and lessons of what audiences had only ever though of as kids films intrigued them and drew them out in droves, on top of having the built in fanbase salivating from everything that JJ teased us with in the previous movie

 

While there were many things wrong with TLJ, I think many fans could have overlooked a lot of them if Luke had been written respectfully and in character. If Luke would have been allowed to actually BE a jedi master instead of a grumpy jerk, it would have improved the film and connected it better to the saga too.

If Luke had been allowed to at least train Rey after losing his jedi order, he still would have fulfilled Yoda’s commission to “ pass on what you have learned”. This, in turn, would have made Rey a true jedi who learned her knowledge and skills from a jedi master instead of downloading them from the villain. Plus, if Luke taught her and agreed to help the resistance, Rey wouldn’t have looked like an idiot because she wouldn’t have been stupid enough to ship herself to the villains in a box.

If Luke’s characterization, personality, integrity, and core traits weren’t totally changed so badly as to make him seem like a different character, there would have been better and more logical and satisfying connection to the OT films.

If Luke wouldn’t have been written as going into his nephew’s room to read his mind without permission, and if he wouldn’t have ignited his lightsaber over his nephew’s head, it wouldn’t have seemed so much like the OT films had been made pointless and rendered null and void. With what was done in TLJ, it makes it seem that Luke is largely responsible for starting his nephew on the path of villainy, which completely undermines what Luke accomplished in RotJ, which was to return his father to the light side and stop him from his path of villainy. Plus, Luke would have been more sympathetic as the guy whose whole order was destroyed by his nephew, through no fault of Luke ‘s own. Now, because of TLJ, the filmmakers are trying to make Kylo more sympathetic by blaming Luke for his nephew’s fall, and subsequently, for the loss of all his jedi students as well. A lot of us are very annoyed that Luke has been terribly disrespected and thrown under the bus in order to serve Kylo,....and he isn’t even the protagonist of this story.

Plus, it would have been very satisfying and exciting to see Luke fulfill what should have been his role as a jedi teacher and mentor. It also would have been wonderful to actually see Luke acting like a jedi and helping in the fight at least once, using his own lightsaber to help others, and manifesting the Skywalker potential that we all knew was supposed to be there at the end of RotJ, and using it for good.

Luke’s role didn’t need to be large or take up that much screen time, but he should have been handled as the asset he should have been, instead of like garbage to destroy and get rid of as soon as possible.

Besides Luke, the other thing that would have vastly improved the Sequel trilogy would have been to actually have a small group of new jedi, a small new jedi order, present in the films. Killing off all of Luke’s jedi and still having only ONE jedi in the galaxy for these new films, greatly impacted and decreased the kinds of stories that could be told, and pretty much determined that these films would be a rehash of what came before.

 

Well said. I've heard it said that if Luke had simply had a real flesh-and-blood lightsaber battle, the critics would have been satisfied, but no, that really mis-diagnoses the issue. He was completely mis-written as a character.

A lot of people assure me RJ is a decent writer with a shelf of awards, but he demonstrated zero insight into someone who shouldn't have been that hard to write. Luke Skywalker isn't particularly deep or complex. He's "everyman" as a hero.

 

Great analysis. well put! thanks for sharing.

 

"The Last Jedi" never struck me as some space age "Apocalypse Now". Frankly, "Rogue One" seemed more like that. And I enjoyed it. I also do not have a problem with a movie subverting the franchise. I usually enjoy it when something new or different is added to a franchise. But it has to be well written and match (at least 85%) what had occurred in previous films. I don't know what was up with Rian Johnson when he wrote the screenplay for "The Last Jedi". Was he on drugs or something? It seemed as if he was trying to be subversive and ended up created massive plot holes and bad character developments . . . like Luke Skywalker in this film. Being subversive for the sake of it. I don't even know if he had really bothered to watch "The Force Awakens". Then again, I wouldn't blame him if he had trouble with that one. I really had expected Johnson to create a SW movie that was something new or original. I was and still am, a big fan of "Looper". The problem for me is that "The Last Jedi" had felt as if he had tried, but failed in the end, because he really didn't know what he was getting himself into.

Even "everyman" heroes can be deep and complex. And even heroes can commit terrible deeds. I've always thought Luke was deep and complex. My problem with his characterization in "The Last Jedi" is that I felt as if I was watching someone other than Luke Skywalker.

 

Replace GL with RJ, George with Rian, Lucas with Johnson, and we are in agreement.

This is such a false equivalency. Obi Wan and Yoda had lived about 35 and 900 years of Galactic Peace, a galaxy filled with a few thousand Jedis, zero Sith, and suddenly found themselves in a galaxy where they are the only two remaining Jedi, no rebel alliance, no resisting force against the oppression, and two babies that would be the only hope against Vader and the Emperor about 20 years later. And that's what they did. They waited. There is nothing unnatural about their self-induced exile, since it was literally their only option. And while the waited, the Rebel Alliance was eventually formed, they rose, they grew, and they fought the Emperor alongside those two babies. Also, it was NOT their mess. It's not Yoda's and Obi Wan's fault that evil rose. The Sith were hiding in the shadows for a millenium or more, and would eventually emerge. The movies show us these events, because it would be extremely boring to show us 45 years of peace. It would not be called Star Wars. I don't understand how anyone can make the claim that they left others to clean up "their mess". But even so, Luke's exile was not the problem. The way that he was portrayed was the problem. Giving up? Nope. I never saw any signs of total surrender from Yoda or Obi Wan.

Not even Yoda can take on the Galactic Empire and two Sith on his own. There was nothing weird there. There is nothing cynical about Yoda's behavior in ESB or ROTJ. Instead, he is training Luke to fight against the Empire. Luke didn't even do that with Rey!

Anything would have been better, if you ask me. And yes, the way this trilogy panned out by that point, I wish Luke had indeed become the hero. I don't even care about Rey anymore. What they wanted to avoid by making Luke the way they did, they managed the opposite. I now don't care about Rey anymore, my attention for the last film has shifted to the original characters, and I care more about how they "did them wrong" in my opinion, than how much I care about the new characters. Any of them.

Yes, I think the backlash would have been significantly less. For me it was the dealbreaker. There are numerous other things that bothered me in TLJ, most important of which is the lack of a story, and the Reylo interaction, but at the end of the day Mark Hamill's character was the dealbreaker. I would still not place it in my top 6 Star Wars films, but it would have been one to watch every now and then. Now I am never watching it again. Three times was more than enough.

 

@DarthFixxxer , very good post! I’m in agreement about everything you wrote in your last post. However we differ about one thing: I only saw The Last Jedi one time, but it was one time too many. I wish that I had never seen that disgusting film! It was an experience that I never want to repeat, and it completely ruined Star Wars for me, because it ruined the OT films and characters for me. This wasn’t just a film to shrug one’s shoulders over and then forget about and look forward to the next film. It impacted the prior films ( and future ones as well) too negatively and too badly. I can’t even watch the OT films anymore.

 

Eh, I get being disappointed and annoyed by the ST, but to let it ruin the SW films I do like... no. I wouldn't let some bad EU books ruin SW for me, so why let some bad films ruin it?