ST What do you think of the fact that Han and Leia were no longer together in the Sequel Trilogy?

Really the ST is a mish mash of OT and PT isn’t it. Han becomes OT Obi-Wan. Luke is OT and PT Yoda. Kylo is Anakin and Darth Vader

 

Listen, I am just trying to engage and talk about Star Wars topics at hand. If you are not interested in engaging, just say that upfront. That way, I don't waste your time sharing thoughts and responding to you.

Also, I am sorry if you feel that I am asking you to apologize, or invalidate your feelings on the matter. I am merely asking questions about your perspective, and trying presenting my viewpoints as someone that actually enjoys the Star War films.

Thanks for the chat.

@Jedi_Sith_Smuggler_Droid

Without a doubt the ST is playing with Star Wars conventions/imagery/themes established in the OT and PT, just as the PT played around with the conventions/imagery/themes established in the OT.

 

When Kylo took off his helmet the first time I was stunned how Anakin that was.

 

Yeah, but the PT was definitely trying to do it's own thing and didn't pigeonhole certain characters into a role just because they were the OT equivalent. If TPM did what TFA did, then Darth Maul would have been Qui-Gon's old apprentice that had fallen to the dark side.

 

I think you’re on to a decent plot idea, maybe they could make a book series about it.

 

...Yeah...

Dooku fell to the dark, it's like a reversal. I always saw Dooku as the dark side Yoda of the PT. He had a minor role in the middle chapter and then shows up in the third chapter just to die after one scene.

 

@jaimestarr , yes, not everything could be perfect for the galaxy or for the OT3 when they decided to make a sequel trilogy. A conflict was needed, but it certainly didn’t need to be the same conflict. Having a sequel trilogy also didn’t mean that absolutely everything had to go bad; that the OT 3 needed to fail at absolutely everything; that Luke, Han, and Leia could leave NO legacy at all. The ST that we got, was the most nihilistic one possible, in my opinion. It burned everything to the ground and gave the Skywalker family the worst possible ending. You said that in order to produce a sequel trilogy that things couldn’t be perfect for the galaxy and for Luke, Han, and Leia. You’re right about that, but what we got was the most complete opposite of “perfect” that I could imagine. Everything was destroyed so that they could start over with shiny, new Disney characters.

There should have been a happy medium. Everything did not need to be brought down and trampled on. If Luke had to lose some of his jedi order ( and I don’t believe he did) , some of the Jedi should have survived. If the new republic needed to suffer losses; the whole thing shouldn’t have been wiped out. If Kylo needed to be a Skywalker ( and he didn’t. We already got that story from George Lucas); then Rey should have been a Skywalker too. And again, if Kylo had to go bad; then at least Han and Leia should have been together. Luke, Han, and Leia didn’t ALL need to die; etc.

See how this works? Yes, some of the happy ending needed to be taken away in order to tell a new story. However, the story could have still allowed for good things to happen for Luke, Han, and Leia, and they could have all left positive legacies with a small Jedi order and a fledgling new republic and a good Skywalker child for future stories. The ST didn’t need to be a profoundly cynical and unsatisfying and bad ending for the entire family. Why make the ST if all you are going to do is bring everything down and subtract from the terrific Lucas story instead of adding to it? Why make a ST just to destroy the RotJ’s happy ending and disrespect the films and characters that started it all?

And, yes, the ST DID disrespect the original films and characters. I have mentioned quite a few times that they did that, so I am not going to repeat my lengthy posts about how and why I feel that way because I am pretty sure that you have read them before. I will just mention three: 1)Anakin/ Vader’s victory over Palpatine and his status as the chosen one was taken away by the return of the sith, palpatine. 2) The OT characters were disrespected by the ST because not only were all three of them killed off without leaving a legacy; but all of them ended up having very sad, miserable, unproductive, unsatisfying endings after the happy ending of RotJ. 3) The ST flipped this saga from being the Skywalker saga to being the Palpatine Saga. Rey Palpatine ends up the big hero who accomplished everything the Skywalkers couldn’t; and she is alive at the end while they are all dead.

 

I get that. I saw it as Anakin continuing on if he head to been put into the cyborg suit by ovi-wan

 

I think ROTJ, although a huge film, was the less well received SW film at the time... not forgetting that, by the time of ROTJ, Star Wars had much more competition in the 'big budget action film' market... and in a sense, ROTJ felt like a slight step backwards in terms of tone.

You have it the wrong way around. If Han and Leia are still together, their relationship is at stake. Having them already separated is one less stake to have on the table.

It doesn't really inform anything. That's the problem. Han seems to be having quite a nice life without Leia. He's flying across the galaxy with Chewie... He's hanging out at Maz's place having laughs etc. It's not like he's a death stick addict lying in a gutter or contemplating suicide.

I don't see it that way. It's not like Han needs to be lifted from his depression (which arguably losing your family would give you)... and it's not like Han is flying around the galaxy on a mission to try and find/save his son from the First Order. He seems to be comfortably getting on with his life. The problem with the Han Solo character/story in TFA (IMHO), is that he's used primarily to advance Rey's character. And whilst Han Solo gets a better outing in the ST than either Luke and Leia, his story is ultimately a very shallow one. His relationship with Leia is not explored... other than they are seperated (divorced?) and that they get back on speaking terms for no apparent reason (assuming they weren't on speaking terms... that's my assumption). He's kind of given up on his son, for no reason that's explored in the film, but gets on board with the mission to SKB, for no real apparent reason other than he 'wants to help' (which raises its own questions as to why he would have left in the first instance) etc. etc. He's a real thinly written character in TFA... everything from the 'Chewie we're home', to 'there's always a way to blow up a Death Star' or whatever the precise dialogue is.

That 'collateral damage' is never explored though. It's not enough (IMHO) to say 'yes things were so bad that we split up' and then claim that to be character development. It's not. It's exposition at best.

What do you think it added to The Godfather II, for example, by having Michael and Kay Corleone still together at the start of the film? Do you think The Godfather II would have been better if it had instead been The Godfather III, and showed Michael and Kay as estranged from the beginning? For me, one of the reasons why The Force Awakens (and the ST as a whole) is a poor film, is that it has little to no interest in investing time in developing its characters, and their relationships, in a meaningful way... primarily because it's much more interested, and invested, in showing the SW tropes.

*Note: I do exclude Finn and Rey's relationship (in the first half of TFA) from that particular criticism, as their initial relationship has a modicum of focus that's appropraite.

Han Solo's function in TFA doesn't have any 'gravitas' IMO. Showing what/how Han and Leia's relationship broke down... and what would cause Han to give up on his son is, in my opinion, where the drama of that particular story is, and where the focus (for those particular characters) should be.

 

Um. You have just as well have Han and Leia together, and Han and Leia still have all these pent up emotions and feelings regarding their son. Hell, you could even show how that all breaks loose in TFA if you wanted to. Like maybe up until now they've kept up with things, they do love each other, and it was better to face this together, but now they're growing apart and ... it's almost awkward. Like maybe Han's mission to find his ship, or when he meets Rey and Finn, is his first "i gotta get out of here finally" moment.

Who knows. There are plenty of ways a writer could do this.

 

Agreed. The issues with the ST are fundamentally structural (IMO). Too many characters, with too little development... and not enough plot to go around. Lucasfilm had, I think, 4 options to play with:

1) Build a story without any legacy characters (in particular without the OT3)
2) Build a story with the legacy characters (in particular with the OT3) as the 'main' characters
3) Build a story with new characters, but have a single legacy character, who can be used consistently throughout, has function and is significant in moving the story forwards
4) A blend of 1 and 2... with all new characters as well as the OT3

I think they went with the option that would, on the face of it, bring the most people into cinemas... but as a consequence, each and every character and relationship (throughout the ST as a whole) is kind of underdeveloped, and they obviously alienated a lot of legacy character fans in the process.

 

In hindsight... I think the ST would have been better if it had never featured the OT3 at all... or if it had been set 100 years post ROTJ, with the only returning character being an ancient Luke Skywalker. That gap in years would not only allow the ST the breathing space to focus on the new characters, but it would have allowed for another 100 year period to mine for EU material, which would have been less damaging for the legacy of the OT3.

 

I agree. I would have been disappointed at first, but it would have been far better than the doom and gloom we got imo. You're not messing with legacies.

 

You could have also written like Han and Leia are together, but they haven't seen in each other in a while because Han is on some damned fool idealistic crusade to ... find Luke. After all, he does owe him one. And this is what they did in the OT, constantly going back and forth saving each other's ass. And so he doesn't go back to Leia, or home, until that happens. He knows he's can't be some Old General in the Resistance, or fight his own dark sider son, so this becomes the only way he can help. Find Luke Skywalker. Hell, maybe even have Leia doubt Luke exists, because he's turned the force off and she can't feel him out there. And yet, here, it's now Han who has the faith, remarkably, because he has no connection to the force like they do.

TFA picks up with Han traveling the galaxy, looking for "windmills", or any word on where this first Jedi temple might be. There's no map. There's none of that. He's been using his old pirate connections. And then he finds Finn, the former stormtrooper with vital information on the FO, and Rey, who's weirdly strong in the force, and it reminds him of his quest, and of his own son. Everything is seemingly merging on one spot. Suddenly he has this renewed urgency to find Luke. Because Han doesn't understand the Force. He doesn't get it. He knows it exists but it's not his thing. But he can save his friend.

And then just when Han has finally found where Luke is, we get a quick OT3 reunion, and he feels like he's earned that he can go home again, like he's accomplished what he set out to do, Kylo kills him.

 

If they didn't feature the OT3, then people would still whine..

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The timeframe in the film doesn't support this. The traumatic event that split them up has already occurred. Why would the events in TFA cause stress to Han and Leia's relationship at that point, yet not earlier? Without heavily rewriting the film, what in TFA would be threatening to their relationship?

I think you are talking two extremes. Han has lost his wife, his son, his ship. All he has is Chewie. It is mentioned by Maz that Han cannot keep running and he needs to go home. This is NOT Han having "quite a nice life." It is also not Han returned to ANH status.

Again, the movie clearly illustrates Han's arc of "getting back home." Is he depressed and "lying in a gutter" when we find him? No. He's still Han Solo...yet, his character does have an arc of getting back to his family. This is undone if he's already with Leia.

The entire trilogy focused on the collateral damage caused by Ben Solo's turn to evil. The repercussions of this event on the OT characters as well as the new characters.

Hmm. I am not quite sure I am getting the connection. Michael and Kay are very different characters than Han and Leia, they perform different functions in the plot, and they are in an entirely different genre (type of movie) than Star Wars. If you are seriously expecting Godfather type characterizations, development, and acting in Star Wars, I suspect your expectations may be a bit much?

Star Wars has never had the subtlety or "realism" of the Godfather films especially in regards to it's characters. The SW characters are largely archetypes and often behave in very mythic/trope-laden ways.

 

The OT used to be ...USED TO BE... a simple fairy tale story about good crushing evil, but the PT established that things weren't exactly all hunky-dory before the events of the OT so I figured the ST would be about how you can't just fight to get back to the status quo (the OT heroes fighting for a return to PT era politics) but you have to go further.

Imagine a Republic that's been returned but still has a rift between pro-Rebel and pro-Empire citizens. The citizens who cheered on Palpatine aren't just going to disappear as soon as the DSII goes supernova. Those people are still around. THERE is your conflict. You throw in the fact that roughly half the population is untrustworthy of the now returning Jedi (that same religious sect that tried to murder a freely elected chancellor a few generations prior) and you've got a story. You can still have an Imperial Remnant that is out in the Outer-Rim (Third Order?)with their own Resistance (the last members of the old Rebellion) stirring up trouble, but the Republic won't step in because it's "Not there fight". Plus, some of the Republic senators are pro-Empire and thus pro-Third Order anyway.

Leia has started to realize that the system she fought to restore (the Republic) isn't all it was cracked up to be (something the audience already knows) and now she has begun to secretly help the Resistance without the approval of the Republic senate. Now the next generation has to pick up the fight and instead of fighting for the status quo, they're actually fighting for something better.

My point is, you do not have to completely destroy the accomplishments of the OT characters in order to invent conflict. You can already read an opening crawl down below.

 

Firstly, relationships don't always break down after traumatic events. I lost a child several years ago (I'll spare the detail), but my wife and I are still happily married. Also, trauma can take years to manifest itself. The breakdown of a marriage/relationship is rarely instantaneous, but can take years to fully breakdown. And given that Kylo Ren didn't go to the darkside 20 years ago, it's perfectly in keeping with real world examples that Han and Leia would still be together, but still suffering the trauma of loss. And yes, anything that would require a substantial re-writing of TFA is worth a punt.

But Han says his home is the Falcon. Contrary statements that the script never tries to resolve... primarily due to it's poor nature IMO. If Han isn't having a nice life, it's up to the film to depict that. He certainly seems to be having a relatively nice life to me, considering the galaxy has turned to ****.

On a quest to destroy SKB, Han runs into his son who then proceeds to stab him through the stomach, with a lighsabre, before falling into an abyss. That's a rather generous way of describing "getting back home" and "getting back to his family"...

There's absolutely no focus throughout the ST... be it characters or story... which is why it's so lacking and why it's nigh on impossible to get any emotional engagement with it IMO. The filmmakers can't even decide between themselves who the characters actually are and what the actual threat is. It's all over the place... hence the lack of aforementioned focus.

There's no reason why a Star Wars film can't aspire to actually develop characters in a well written and meaningful way. Michael and Kay aren't (or shouldn't be) that different to Leia and Han. It's a a study of how bad decisions/events can break families apart. Maybe if the ST had aspired to something like that (given that we had Hamill, Fisher and Ford back), rather than focusing on shoehorning in existing iconography for a quick buck, we'd have an ST that is more substantial that what we're left with.

Michael Corleone is an archetype. Most of the best films out there have archetypes front and centre. Everything from The Godfather, The Empire Strikes Back to Saving Private Ryan. The difference is that bad films, like the ST, are badly constructed (IMO)... it has little to do with the use of archetypes.

 

1. I am sorry for your loss.
2. It's just as valid/real that Han and Leia would be split. Either choice works as a concept. Nothing presented in ROTJ is negated by having Leia and Han be apart when TFA begins. It's personal response/choice. Personally, I enjoyed seeing them reunite and could tell they were still in love.

Well, then we are on to a new and separate topic.

Which it is. Yet, so is Leia. Maz says Han's been "running from this fight for too long" and that "it's time (for Han) to go home." Meaning, to Leia.

Leia pleads with Han to bring their son home. Tragic as is ends, Han is on a quest for his family....just as much as he is on a quest for the Resistance to help destroy SKB. Again, Han Solo is trying to reunite his family and "get back home" despite the end results.

I disagree. You are welcome to your view, but I don't think TFA would have connected with as many people and tapped into the cultural zeitgeist as it did if it had the fundamental story flaws that you are claiming. Bottom Line: Your lack of emotional engagement wasn't a shared experience. Millions of people seemed to be drawn into this film and connect with it on an emotional level...even if you didn't.

I'm not saying Star Wars can't aspire to be written with the nuance and grittiness of a Godfather film in terms of characters, yet that's not really the SW style historically. These aren't R rated dramas aimed at adults, they are space operas aimed at kids. Ergo, while SW is about family, they typically are not character studies about the intricacies of families breaking apart. SW is much more mythic/archetypal/broad than that.

When has SW ever aspired to be like The Godfather? It's interesting that you mention having Hamill, Fisher and Ford back because they are existing SW iconography. It seems like you wish more of the focus would have been on them?

Michael Corleone IS an archetype, but he's also much more fleshed out and real than any existing Star Wars character. Your comparison seems to be suggesting that the OT, and PT treated/examined/portrayed their characters as in depth as Godfather films while the ST did not. This is way off base.

The ST basically handled it's characters in the same fashion/form as the OT and PT. Face it: As great as a character as Han Solo is, he was never treated/handled in a way that The Godfather films treats/handles/portrays Michael Corleone.

SW characters are much more broad in their characterizations and less intricate/detailed than anything you'd see in Coppola's crime epic. Why? Because George Lucas designed them that way. He made these films for kids. While the SW characters are not shallow per se, they are easily identifiable, digestible, and relatable. There is not a lot of detail/shading/depth to them when compared to the characters in The Godfather. Now, that is in no way a knock against Star Wars. It is simply a conceit of genre and style. To argue otherwise is a bit bewildering.

 

It's not really about whether it's valid or not. Any idea is valid. It's more about finding where the drama is within the story. Obviously, given that I think the ST is lacking in both drama and story, for me, the films would have been better focusing on what led to the split of the Solo/Organa family and what led Luke to abandon all he believed in. That is much more compelling that what we got, which was largely defeated and deflated legacy characters whom were nothing more than wallpaper to Kylo and Rey's 'will they won't they' romance.

Well obviously. But I was talking about changes (any change big or small) to the basic plot, situations and relationships that I believe would have improved the ST.

As I say, the film is not consistent with itself. Han clearly states, 'Chewie we're home'. Are we, the audience, to assume he was lying when he said that? I don't think so. The film seems to be suggesting that he prefers his life in the stars. The thing is Han and Leia are separated. Absolutely nothing within the film resolves the differences between Han and Leia to show the audience that they would be 'back together'... other than a hug. Which doesn't really demonstrate anything other than affection does it? And no one is denying they don't have affection for each other. But is he back 'home' at the rebel base with Leia? Not really. Nothing has been resolved between them... and of course shortly after Han is dead. It's all about the surface with the ST.

Leia says it in passing. After all, they don't know Ben is on SKB do they? But that random kind of internal logic is just a product of poor dialogue IMO. Clearly Leia wants Ben back... and clearly, at that point, Han wants Ben to see the error of his ways. But the issue is the general lack of context with everything and everyone. And context is crucial to understanding where a character is, and where a character is going. I find pretty much every single character in the ST just meanders through the films with little sense of direction.

Of course it would be succesfull. It was the first SW film in over a decade. The original characters were returning. A fortune was spent on marketing. Lucasfilm slapped OT iconography over absolutely everything. It was largely inoffensive to the casual viewer. It was bound to be a big hit regardless... However, none of those things mean that it wasn't fundamentally flawed in terms of creativity, character development and story. But yes, of course it's just an opinion.

I'm not sure about that. The drop off in revenue from TFA to TLJ to Solo to TROS (both in box office and merchandising sales), has been quite considerable. But that's a different conversation.

I think you're missing the point. No one is stating that Han Solo should be swearing and showing violence towards Leia. Is that what you think this is about? No. It's about identifying where the drama of a story should be, and allowing that story to focus on characters, and their relationships, rather than filling the screen with pointless shenanigans. The ST throws multiple things at the screen to see which sticks, the consequence being (IMO), we have hugely underdeveloped characters and concepts. Good films tend to know who their main characters are and where there're going. The ST doesn't do that because it lurches from on idea to the next.

I'm not sure I ever stated that SW should aspire to be The Godfather specifically??? I did, however, suggest they should aspire to be better films than what they currently are under Disney. And I think that starts by putting concepts, character and story ahead of $$$...

So it's good that you concede that Michael Corleone is an archetype, but I think you're just conflating the nature of a more adult film and a fantasy film with a broader sensibility. That the films are different genres, with different tones, does not mean that characters aren't afforded equal attention in terms of how their respective stories play out... and I personally think Luke and Anakin Skywalker/Darth Vader (in particular) are as fleshed out as any character in The Godfather.

Not really no. Pretty much every single character in the ST is paper thin and a walking cliche. And again you miss the point by putting forward a straw man. No one is suggesting that the ST should have copied The Godfather. I put forward the example of how Michael and Kay Corleone's relationship was portrayed in The Godfather II, as opposed to The Godfather III, to demonstrate that the breakdown of the relationship provides much more drama than them just already being estranged/separated.

I disagree. Again, you're conflating genre/tone/style and 'realism' with 'substance'... and I think we've just become accustomed to the vacuous nature of the sequel trilogy, which has all the character and depth of an Ewok movie. In my opinion of course.

 

Honestly, one of the worst decisions Abrams and Kasdan made, We were bereft of 10 years of SW and one thing the fans wanted to see was the OT3 together. Not only does JJ fail to deliver that, but he also breaks them apart and makes their only son a villain? Did anybody in the fandom want THAT? It's so bizarre because TROS is a fan service movie made by JJ but why couldn't he offer the fans this kind of fanservice in TFA. It wouldn't detract from the overall story he was telling, which ended up being a POS anyway.

 

I hear you. Yet, this is a focus on the legacy characters and not new characters. Legacy characters was not the intention of the Lucasfilm, nor the pattern of Star Wars storytelling in previous films.

Again, Han's arc is returning home or to his family. He gets the Falcon, he reconnects with Leia, and he dies attempting to bring his son home. Simply put: If Han and Leia start TFA together, this arc/narrative thrust wouldn't be possible....regardless of the end result.

What? In passing? It's the crux of that entire scene/exchange. She gives Han a mission/task that is personal to them as a couple/family. It seems perfectly clear that Kylo Ren would be at the heart of darkness on the giant, villainous, bad guy base. Heck, Leia might even sense as much.

You could just as easily be talking about The Phantom Menace here. A movie that , despite more hype/promotion/anticipation, didn't actually resonate with the critics/general public as much as TFA.

You are suggesting that (despite the fact that TFA is one of the highest earning, most popular, films of all time) that the movie didn't actually resonate with a massive amount of people? This movie had an overwhelmingly positive response from critics, casual movie goers, and even a large portion of the ever hard to please fanbase.

The Force Awakens is simply one of the better Star Wars films in existence. It's weakness isn't that it's a poorly constructed mess, but that it adheres too closely to the classic Star Wars playbook. Any negatives you can throw at this movie structurally can be thrown at any Star Wars film.

You compared Han and Leia to Michael Corleone and Kay. I am not sure why. I don't think box office $$$$ was ever part of the comparison. Was it?

Again, you brought up the comparison of Star Wars characters to Godfather characters. Overall, the characters in each saga are apples and oranges in terms of approach, attention, acting, function, and genre. Obviously, characters have narrative arcs and journeys in each series, yet Godfather is constructed as dense/nuanced/realistic, Star Wars characters are constructed to be easily identifiable, classic archetypes, easily recognized by all ages.

Remember: A large part of the appeal of Star Wars in 1977 was that it was THE OPPOSITE kind of film as The Godfather. Instead of anti-heroes and morally grey criminals as protagonists, Star Wars was a return to the "good guys wear white bad buys wear black" serials and characters of the 30's, 40's, and 50's.

Bottom line: I'm not sure what connection you were/are trying to draw between the characters in Star Wars and The Godfather.

To me, it's like comparing the musical stylings of Paul Simon to Prince. Yeah they both play guitar, and write music, yet they are entirely different entities, performers, musicians, etc.

An accusation that basically has been leveled at Star Wars characters by snide critics since 1977. So what?

You are going to have to walk me through why you think Michael and Kay are like Han and Leia. As I've said, Michael Corleone is an archetype. Yet, he is an anti hero. Corleone's story, function, character arc, and surrounding relationships will always play differently than Han Solo,. Han is a lovable rogue with a heart of gold who is a relatively straight forward hero. Is he a scoundrel? Yes. Is he an antihero? Nope.

Again, I just don't get the point you are making with the connection. I am interested though. Explain it differently perhaps?

Your opinion is yours to have. Again, you are accusing the ST of things MANY naysaying critics have hurled at Star Wars over the decades: Style over substance. Too bad. It's gotta be rough not to like Star Wars.