What do you think of the Star Wars Sequels?

[Joshua Jones]

I think you make a lot of good points: Rey does feel like she does too much too soon at least in terms of the Force. I think the scene where she pilots the Falcon is establishing her piloting skills considering that it comes less than thirty minutes into the first movie she's in (Luke in contrast says a couple of times early on that he's a pilot). But I think that if, after piloting the Falcon, she had then struggled to grasp the Force, fewer people would have a problem with that specific skillset because it wouldn't be endemic of "well, she can just do anything, can't she?"

And again, I'm not looking to change anyone's mind. I don't know if you've seen the Disney Gallery series on Disney+ about The Mandalorian (it's basically a roundtable discussion by the creators of the show) but on one of the episodes Dave Filoni goes into this long dissection of the Duel of the Fates from Phantom Menace: about how it is the turning point of Anakin's progression as a character, how much Qui Gon means to that character development and how it changes Anakin's entire arc going forward. He does this to a table full of Star Wars experts, people who have grown up on Star Wars and know it pretty well--and they are completely floored by this explanation because The Phantom Menace was so horribly botched from a story perspective that the importance of Qui Gon as a father figure to Anakin never even crossed their minds. That's basically how I feel defending Rey's character: I think I see something in how the movies wanted Rey to be perceived, but a lot of how they use her character is so scattershot that people aren't going to see it unless they want to see it. (I hope that doesn't sound self-congratulatory because I don't mean it to be. Sometimes I think I'm just reading into something that's not really there but I want it to be.)

And my first post, while mostly for fun, illustrates kind of my understanding of the growth of a fan's expertise: that when you first get into a series the author is the expert and you roll with a lot of what they throw at you because they're the ones who know the rules of the world and how everything works. But as you go further into the series, you become an expert and can begin to pick out the things later on that don't go along with the truths that were earlier established when the author was the expert. (And yeah, I agree that there's way too much inconsistency between the trilogies).

Thank you, and I think you made some good points as well. I'm not so much trying to change your mind either as defend my position and engage in an intelligent discussion of variant viewpoints which doesn't descend into accusations of harboring Nazi sympathies... so, you know, the opposite of Twitter...

Yeah, that approach may have worked, but I think it would still need some foreshadowing before she's running toward the ships. TBH, what's unforgivable about it is that it would have been really easy... like replacing her little speeder thing with a small, short range atmospheric plane, or a line or two where she casually mentions flying (you know, kinda like what they did with Luke,...). If they wanted to establish why she had the ability to use a lightsaber, they could have given her a metal sword (say, stashed inside her staff or something...) which she used to fight or hunt with or something. Her growing in the Force could have been really interesting, especially if she could always use it a bit but became much more capable as time went on. There are alot of ways they could have made her abilities plausible, but as it stands...

I haven't had the chance to watch that yet, so perhaps I'll watch it soon! And I honestly enjoyed both of your posts!

 

[sule]

Yeah, that approach may have worked, but I think it would still need some foreshadowing before she's running toward the ships.

I get that. They didn't let her establish her competency until it was immediately relevant to the story. You provide some interesting fixes for that problem, as well. (As a weird aside, I think one of the novelizations of TFA mentions that she has a flight simulator in her camel walker home, but obviously that doesn't matter because it doesn't come up in the movie).

engage in an intelligent discussion of variant viewpoints which doesn't descend into accusations of harboring Nazi sympathies...

This is a thread about Star Wars, so obviously it would descend into accusations of killing younglings.

 

[soulsinging]

I will certainly grant that Rey ought to have particular talents based on her backstory. I have absolutely no issue, for example, with her being talented fighting with her staff and rather acrobatic. However, so far as we can tell, she has subsisted on collecting junk from downed craft and has never flown before, yet is able to step in and not only pilot the Millenium Falcon, but do so with incredible skill. Also, while combat experience with her staff may help her in picking up on lightsaber combat, a sword type weapon requires a completely different fighting style from a staff or polearm, and it has been demonstrated in canon that becoming proficient in lightsaber combat requires intense training for an extended duration. Unless, of course, you're Rey. And that's where the Mary Sue part starts to come in... she can just up and do incredibly technical things which every other character over the course of 6 movies has had to train to do, with precisely zero hints she has ever done something like this before.

....

Contrast this to Luke... Luke's piloting background is expressly stated as a companion of Biggs and Wedge recreationally flying a T-16 while shooting womp rats and flying through Begger's canyon. So, it's established that he has flown before, and done similar things to what he would be doing on the Death Star run. He actually doesn't dogfight much... he shoots one fighter while its pilot was focused on another fighter, and managed to not die long enough for Wedge, then Han to save him. The only other time he's fighting in a vehicle is on Hoth, where he's targeting walkers. In other words, his combat flying doesn't take much more skill than he is established to have flying a T-16 on Tatooine, as he is not doing things like taking out other fighter pilots solely through skill like Rey does... with no established experience.

Regarding lightsaber training, Luke doesn't fight anyone with a lightsaber until Empire Strikes Back, which is after he received training from Obi Wan and had time to play around with it between the movies. He then fights the Abominable Snowman (I honestly can't remember if they named it in movie and I haven't looked up the name...) and chops off one arm before running, uses it to stab an ATAT, and then gets training from Yoda. After an indefinite period of time under Yoda's tutelage, he flies off to confront Vader at the protest of both Obi-Wan and Yoda, who are proven right when he is curb stomped by Vader. It is only in Return of the Jedi that he is competent with his lightsaber, which is after significant self training between movies and the construction of a new lightsaber on top of past training. To put it another way, Luke had to work hard during and between two whole movies before he killed a single person with his lightsaber and could stand toe to toe with Vader. Rey, in contrast, merely picked one up and bested Luke's student in the first movie she encountered one, and never properly lost a fight after that either.

I think you can make similar distinctions for Rey:

She doesn't dogfight much either. She runs from a few TIE fighters that thought they were on a simple strafing run and wound up chasing a ship that's faster, better armed and shielded, and more maneuverable than it looks, all during an engagement at planet surface rather than the space combat they're designed for. Even then, Rey doesn't so much out-pilot them as use her knowledge of the local surface and its wreckage to shake them off and run for it.

For the lighstaber duel, she doesn't best a Vader. Part of Kylo's thing is that he's nowhere near Vader in terms of fearsomeness or experience. On top of that, he's wracked with insecurity and doubt about his talent and devotion, which Rey has already exacerbated by resisting his mind probing. So she's literally in his head. By the time they fight, it's minutes after the tension and emotion of him murdering his father before racing across an exploding planet to capture a foe he's not sure he can beat. His distraction lets even Finn land a lucky blow that has Ren bleeding and frustrated, and then as he's fading, Rey is able to wrest a lightsaber from him and fight him off. It also serves as a good illustration of the jedi power... her ability to master her emotions in the moment gives her just enough of an edge to escape with her life. His wild indulgence in his chaotic emotions has left him weakened and confused and unable to finish the fight.

 

[Joshua Jones]

I think you can make similar distinctions for Rey:

She doesn't dogfight much either. She runs from a few TIE fighters that thought they were on a simple strafing run and wound up chasing a ship that's faster, better armed and shielded, and more maneuverable than it looks, all during an engagement at planet surface rather than the space combat they're designed for. Even then, Rey doesn't so much out-pilot them as use her knowledge of the local surface and its wreckage to shake them off and run for it.

For the lighstaber duel, she doesn't best a Vader. Part of Kylo's thing is that he's nowhere near Vader in terms of fearsomeness or experience. On top of that, he's wracked with insecurity and doubt about his talent and devotion, which Rey has already exacerbated by resisting his mind probing. So she's literally in his head. By the time they fight, it's minutes after the tension and emotion of him murdering his father before racing across an exploding planet to capture a foe he's not sure he can beat. His distraction lets even Finn land a lucky blow that has Ren bleeding and frustrated, and then as he's fading, Rey is able to wrest a lightsaber from him and fight him off. It also serves as a good illustration of the jedi power... her ability to master her emotions in the moment gives her just enough of an edge to escape with her life. His wild indulgence in his chaotic emotions has left him weakened and confused and unable to finish the fight.

I see where you're coming from, but I must respectfully disagree. My issue isn't with how well Rey can pilot as much as it is that she can pilot at all with no foreshadowing whatsoever. The fact that she can pilot as well as shown is merely the icing on the issue. Not saying A New Hope is a perfect movie at all, but one thing they did very well was foreshadowing Luke's piloting experience. It was subtle and, most importantly, believable. Rey's ability just came out of nowhere as the plot demanded.

You do raise an excellent point, though, that Kylo was definitely not at the top of his game during their first encounter, and I completely agree that he is clearly depicted as a lesser of Vader. The problem is threefold here. First, anger, fear, and aggression are supposed to be things which empower the dark side, so arguably, he should have been stronger at this moment, rather than weaker. Second, at least the Wookiepedia page indicates that he is actually supposed to be relatively well trained and skilled with the lightsaber, and he's certainly no slouch with the Force. Third, so far as I know, Rey hadn't seen a lightsaber being used prior to this, much less seen lightsaber combat, much less tried to do it herself. I've been doing martial arts for the better part of two decades, and one cannot simply pick up a completely unfamiliar weapon and hope to best someone who has been training with it for quite some time, light injury or no. The fact that Jedi are trained for something like 20 years to become a Jedi Knight confirms this is pretty much how it works in Star Wars canon as well.

That said, the fact that Finn could at least hold his own for a bit against Kylo is certainly a relevant fact in this conversation. The problem arises in that Kylo bests Snoke's guard alongside Rey, which means either everyone in this continuity is a shadow of the characters in the first two trilogies, or Kylo was so off his game during the first duel that, quite frankly, it strains credulity, especially being he arguably would be more powerful at this moment. Either way, it leads to degrading the threat that Kylo poses to anyone, unless of course one is willing to grant that Rey is a Mary Sue, and Finn obtained his skills in this narrow area ex machina (this wouldn't necessarily make Finn a Marty Stu, though, as he doesn't gain all of his abilities in this manner). Or, alternatively, it could just be granted that this scene happened because the producers believed it would be epic, and thus just decided to make it happen regardless of how little sense it makes in the storyline.

And that's the conundrum these movies face. In my opinion, they so badly wanted to have a strong female action hero that they overshot and made her too skilled, and this without explanation. This can only be interpreted as her opponents aren't capable, or she is over capable, and either way, it diminishes the stakes of the movies, in my opinion.

All that said, I'm greatly enjoying the back and forth here, and certainly welcome rebuttals of my points!

 

[Heijan Xavier]

My biggest concern is not the Rey Mary Sue thing. It's not even RJ's destruction of Luke. It's the fact that the New Republic was obliterated in an instant. If you don't read the books and the comics, the NR is not even an entity that you acknowledge as a real thing.

I've heard that Filoni and Favreau are working to relegate the sequel trilogy to kind of Legends status as an alternate timeline--like it was all a force vision of Luke's. He will send Ahsoka back to the Death Star, the moment before Palpatine teleports to Exegol, to kill Palpatine and prevent the sequel trilogy events from ever happening at all.

 

[Rodders]

Poor trilogy or not, I think it'd be disrespectful to retcon the entire sequel.

 

[Toby Frost]

I agree, and I think it would set a weird precedent, where stories could just be endlessly retconned until enough people were happy with them to pass into canon.

 

[CupofJoe]

I liked the films. I thought each was enjoyable on its own to a certain degree. None will trouble the lists of greatest films ever made, but they were never meant to. I loved the horses in space sequence [stupid but fun] and when Rey kept telling Finn not to grab hold and try to save her [wonderfully comic and character defining]...
What I don't get is why people take Star Wars SOOOOOOO seriously?!?!
Yes there are flaws and omission in the films [all of the films - I hate the f$7£ing Ewoks], but the level of expectation and requirement for everything in the recent films to exactly right [whatever that maybe] means that they were always going to be disliked if not hated by some viewers.

 

[HareBrain]

I think it would set a weird precedent

I think that was already set by Dallas.

 

[Dave]

I think it goes back further than that. In Marvel and DC comics obviously, but even in much earlier film franchises - how many times has the Tarzan story been re-told, or Frankenstein's monster, the Mummy's curse, Count Dracula. Go back further and theatre plays get embellished too, most especially in the case of Pantomime Fairy Tales where there are al kinds of characters and scenes that were never in Scheherazade's tales.

 

[Toby Frost]

What I don't get is why people take Star Wars SOOOOOOO seriously?!?!
Yes there are flaws and omission in the films [all of the films - I hate the f$7£ing Ewoks], but the level of expectation and requirement for everything in the recent films to exactly right [whatever that maybe] means that they were always going to be disliked if not hated by some viewers.

I agree. I don't think the "It was a vital part of my childhood" argument works, because once you're a grown-up, you ought to understand that (a) it was also a money-making franchise, (b) it's not your possession and (c) it's not real and real lives aren't at stake (or certainly shouldn't be), and you are basically given the choice to watch it or not. The level of entitlement in some parts of the internet (not this site) is incredible.

 

[thaddeus6th]

Disrespectful, yes.

But still the right thing to do. I feel sorry for the cast and crew but the sequel trilogy buggered up a hell of a lot, not least turning Vader's redemption into a failure, and turning Luke from a beacon of optimism into borderline child murderer who is also so incompetent (despite being able to defeat Darth Vader in a duel) he gets easily beaten by a student.

 

[Overread]

Honestly the changes to Luke are, for me, perfectly fine. The problem is that the film started far too long after those events. We didn't see his struggle to rebuild the Jedi alone with very limited resources (the Emperor destroyed so much that even within a generation or two they'd become mythological). Remember his training was very short snippets so formally he knew quite little. Trying to teach new generations whilst also warding off the influence of the Dark Side and not trying to fail is a big ask for someone who basically has a cobbled together understanding. With such a situation it would be easy for new students to learn things he had not learned and to make mistakes he never would have even thought possible.

He ended Return of the Jedi, but he wasn't a master. Heck don't forget he only just beat Vader in one on one combat. He was a hero but he still didn't actually kill the Emperor - that was all Vader. Plus he only just won the duel by touching the Dark Side, by unleashing his anger. When confronted with that he gave in. Granted he was trying to turn Vader, which worked, but in the end he wasn't the best Light Side fighter.

Of many elements in the series this was one I was very happy with, but at the same time I appreciate that it was very poorly presented. I think film 1 should have been Lukes struggles and failures. Also a film showing us how the Republic was rebuilding and what was happening. Basically ALL the information and setup that we lacked. Who are the First Order; why are they at threat; why is the republic how it is. Heck why is the First Order being fought by "rebels" instead of an organised allied Republic fleet. That thing really felt odd; esp in the 2nd film where suddenly the Repub.....er Rebels are down to just 1 capital ship on the run*.

That first film should have set the scene; then a time jump at the end toward Ray's story. Heck that might have pushed to 4 films instead and that's no bad thing for Disney (3 isn't a magical number). It would have set things up for all the key cast to be moved into new positions with the audience brought along for the ride. We'd understand why Luke failed; why the Republic isn't winning; how the First Order rose to power; who the freaking heck Snoke is and why he's even important; why Han lost the Falcon; why Ray is in hiding; why Luke fled; why the Jedi are not returned etc.... It would set the scene for all these events rather than leaving them to fill-in content or the imagination of the audience to work out.


*Esp when most of the First Order upper command appear to be rather immature teenagers...

 

[CupofJoe]

I like the idea of a film between 6 and 7. A mid tale origins story! With a bit of good writing, you could have peripheral characters telling the tale with only the occasional [suitably de-aged or generated] appearance from the Leia, Luke, and Han.
Maybe use Maz Katana as the centre? As they seem to know everyone and have been around forever.

 

[Rodders]

Some really interesting comments here. I agree with Cup of Joe that the movies can be enjoyed, but i can never forgive Disney for walking all over the fact that Vader brought balance to the force at the endo of RoTJ.

There are a lot of issues with Star Wars at the moment, mostly l believe from Lucasfilm believing in their cash cow and not showing enough leadership by ensuring that there was an agreed story to adhere to. I must confess that i enjoyed both TFA and TLJ (at least it tried to do something different), but TROS was really awful.

I totally agree with John Boyega's statement that Disney didn't know what to do with Finn and Poe (and to a lesser extent, Rose). A Shame as their characters were actually pretty likeable. Finn deserved much more, i thought.

We have to keep in mind that most fans of the franchise are respond normally. "It's only a movie". There has been a disappointing rise in toxic fandom over the last few decades and for a life long fan such as myself, it is really disheartening.

I am bouyed by the success and production values of both Rogue One and The Mandalorian, (less so with Solo), although i suspect that this might be more due to the fact that both stories take place during the timeline of "my" Star Wars. I am looking forward to seeing where Star Wars goes from here on.

Cup of Joe. An interim story is a brilliant idea. You could tell it flashback style similar to Emperor Mollari in B5's "In The Beginning".

 

[CupofJoe]

Cup of Joe. An interim story is a brilliant idea. You could tell it flashback style similar to Emperor Mollari in B5's "In The Beginning".

And get J. Michael Straczynski to write it!

 

[Dave]

The difference with Babylon 5 is that J. Michael Straczynski had the whole thing completely mapped out from day one. It is hard to expect episodic TV franchises to do this as it isn't the way they are usually written, even less so with a film franchise.

There are a lot of issues with Star Wars at the moment, mostly l believe from Lucasfilm believing in their cash cow and not showing enough leadership by ensuring that there was an agreed story to adhere to.

To be honest, there are similar issues with the Star Trek franchise at the moment. We have Picard and Discovery both doing their own thing on different TV Networks but within one alternate universe, while the films do their own thing in another. Discoveryjumped into the future so leap-frogging Picard but still on a ship from before the Kirk era There is also The Lower Decks animation which is yet another sequel, There are two possible other series in the works - a con-current prequel, and another that could be anywhere in time. Nowhere does it appear that anyone has mapped out how these all fit together and it shows. However, the cash cow is still producing and that seems more important.

 

[Boneman]

Lockdown being upon us, I recently watched the last sequels, and was... a tad bored. When I saw them at the cinema, I loved the theatricals, the big effects, and I enjoyed most of the characters. But given the passage of time I see how weak the storylines actually are, and how a little forethought could have turned these films into masterpieces. Rey having no parentage she knew of, meets droid, discovers the force, where've I seen that before?? Luke being so negative, runnning away so far because of a mistake with a student? Did he know of Rey's existence? C3PO only awoke when she turned up, but no explanation was ever given. (Couldn't have been the presence of 'strong force', since Leia had been there all the time). The Emperor still alive??? I loved Kylo's redemption (but it was mirroring Vader's too closely) and it would have been way more tear-jerking, and surprising if Wookie had died, not Solo... We knew it was coming, after all, that could have been a real surprise.

And that, for me, was the problem. Very few surprises. Episodes IV, V and VI had so many (yes I know it was all new, but even so...) it was just following a (well-tried in Disney's eyes) formula, but and naturally became formulaic. Predictable, even. Perhaps it's my expectations that are set too high, but they have Billions to spend, and Billions to make, I guess I expected better from them. Oh well, Going to watch Rogue One next. Now there's a surprising film...

 

[Vince W]

I think Rowan Atkinson sums up my feelings about the sequels nicely. Just just replace British with Fan. 6.03 through 7.11.

 

[Bick]

I feel the sequels were so appallingly awful (dreadful films in their own right as well as trampling on the original film legacy), that rather than try and retcon them, Disney should just say, “sorry they were complete crap, forget that storyline and let’s all just agree they never happened”, delete them worldwide, and remake sequels that use existing (and decent) extended universe stories, such as Thrawn. Won’t happen, but would be my preference. For me, like George Lucas and Mark Hamill, there are 6 Star Wars Episodes.