Official TROS Spoilers discussion

If the desired effect was "Hey remember how terrible the PT/TLJ were because they dared to not make the audience bask in the warm, safe nostalgia of the OT? Have we got the product for you, 100% warm and fuzzy nostalgia with characters you can project on to?" then he kind of f**ked up on that end? The fact that the movie culminates an Ersatz Emperor Clone (which you had to know about the tie-in novel to get that detail since his editor said that they cut that explanation from the movie) sucking the life force out of two younger characters who were originally written as new and unique characters (but the Those Fans:tm: complained that she was a Mary Sue and he was an Emo Brat so they were recast as "Luke But a Girl" and "Darth Vader Jr.") kind of sums up his vision for the ST. The ironic thing is that TRoS had less box office than TLJ, less Internet buzz/memes, and ranks lower in Rotten Tomatoes. Oh and Rian Johnson was instead doing a victory lap of making more box office and doing the awards circuit with with Knives Out . Also forming a new production company with some of the LFL producers/creatives who appear to have departed in the wake of JJ shutting them out of the production/installing his former producer in a leadership role there.

IDK - besides maybe a better strategy would've been actually hiring/working with more competent writers, JJ needs to have a better sounding board than listening to Simon Pegg, Kevin Smith, & Greg Gruenberg? Because that movie was probably their idea of a great Star Wars experience and it shows.

He ruined Kylo. He regressed his character to pre TLJ, then gave him a rushed redemption and a mind blowingly ridiculous ending.
He ruined Rey, turning her from an interesting character into a dull self righteous bore.
He threw away the character arcs Rian gave Finn and Poe - Finn as leader of the stormtroopers rebellion, Poe as general - reducing them to Rey's groupies.
He disrespected Leia, making her a horrible mother who chose a stranger over her own child.
And he thoroughly destroyed SW, by killing off the entire bloodline of the heroes and replacing them with the villain's descendant.

I've spoken to Kylo haters, Finn fans, people who didn't like the other films.....all of them loathed TROS.
So, who did JJ make this film for?
I only wish GL could buy the rights to LF back and hire Rian to make a real ending to the Skywalker saga!

Well, if JJ is truly behind the leaks he's dumber than I thought

I guess even more than being just plain bad, TRoS has the dubious honor of being basically forgotten. What should have had tons of staying weight literally faded away right after the premier. SW is being carried by video games, cartoons and Mando.

motherofpearl1 wrote:He ruined Kylo. He regressed his character to pre TLJ, then gave him a rushed redemption and a mind blowingly ridiculous ending.
He ruined Rey, turning her from an interesting character into a dull self righteous bore.
He threw away the character arcs Rian gave Finn and Poe - Finn as leader of the stormtroopers rebellion, Poe as general - reducing them to Rey's groupies.
He disrespected Leia, making her a horrible mother who chose a stranger over her own child.
And he thoroughly destroyed SW, by killing off the entire bloodline of the heroes and replacing them with the villain's descendant.

I've spoken to Kylo haters, Finn fans, people who didn't like the other films.....all of them loathed TROS.
So, who did JJ make this film for?
I only wish GL could buy the rights to LF back and hire Rian to make a real ending to the Skywalker saga!

@motherofpearl1

—Racist, sexist bigots who didn’t like Kelly Marie Tran.
—Guys in their 30s and 40s who wanted to see Tatooine and Wedge Antilles again.
—....yep. That’s pretty much it.

So he pandered to a handful because they were offensive on twitter and Instagram
What sort of message does that send?

It's weird because JJ himself has never actually been that active on social media, you think he'd be aware that the online world does not necessarily reflect the world as a whole.

Moonjump05 wrote:I guess even more than being just plain bad, TRoS has the dubious honor of being basically forgotten.  What should have had tons of staying weight literally faded away right after the premier.  SW is being carried by video games, cartoons and Mando.

@Moonjump05

I suppose that gives me a bit of hope that one day in the distant future with a new set of management, they'll do some kind of damage control.

The fact that Disney ramped up the SW content machine, and had it all come out at once (TROS, Mando, Fallen Order, Resistance, EU books and comics), ended up being a good thing, because it meant SW didn't have to hinge on a singular thing for audiences. Just a shame they mucked up the biggest, most important piece of that puzzle. It's forgettableness might actually be to the brand's benefit. Like a weird, collective fever dream we can all just mostly ignore.

Enough with damage control. Own up to your mistakes. Make stories worth telling not because they are reaction to backlash. ST is a damage control trilogy that was created as a reaction to PT backlash.And then every single movie in the trilogy was a reaction to something. Stop reacting. Stick to your guns.

At this point I'm just hoping human civilization survives long enough for there to be a Star Wars season for Ryan Murphy's Feud so we enjoy the comedy of JJ doing a slow burn against Rian Johnson a la Hux and Kylo and making one of his nerd BFFs/Bad Robot employees drop spoilers on Reddit mods a la Deep Throat or by talking to them on the phone with a towel over the receiver.

The fact that he made sure to cover up Rey's arm scar shows that this was all JJ and no supposed insider leaks will persuade me otherwise. That some petty sh!t. Not to mention him cutting down TLJ/RJ in those promo interviews. I'm not saying there weren't any demands from the studio execs about the story direction. All I'm saying is that he went through with those demands and then some more cause he wanted to steal Rian's thunder and thought he'd somewhat reinvent the wheel with TROS by winning back all the petty fanboys and bullies.

Nyx wrote:The fact that he made sure to cover up Rey's arm scar shows that this was all JJ and no supposed insider leaks will persuade me otherwise. That some petty sh!t. Not to mention him cutting down TLJ/RJ in those promo interviews. I'm not saying there weren't any demands from the studio execs about the story direction. All I'm saying is that he went through with those demands and then some more cause he wanted to steal Rian's thunder and thought he'd somewhat reinvent the wheel with TROS by winning back all the petty fanboys and bullies.

Thanks for mentioning the scar, it's so very obvious that it was supposed to mean something, so Abrams covered it up.

I think it was supposed to represent Kylo and Rey as two halves of the same coin. Abrams however wanted his little darling Rey to be the dominant character. So he shoved Kylo into the background. Unfortunately he completely destroyed Rey. By the end of the film I couldn't stand her.


Rey and Kylo together were the beating heart of the ST. Rian saw this.
JJ didn't.

I doubt that JJ (or anyone outside of Reylos) was thinking about the scar at all, if he wanted to get rid of it the scar could have just disappeared, it wasn’t some big gaping wound. We assume that he’s thinking as deeply about these things as we do when in fact he’s quite surface-level. I’m pretty sure JJ just decided that the band on Rey’s arm looked “cool” and that’s all there is to it.

I think the placement of the armband actually isn't quite where her scar was, perhaps it is just a cool accessory and nothing more. But then again, Kylo's scar kept moving, maybe Rey's did too.

I've always been a little hesitant with putting motives on JJ and Terrio, because while I do think some of the things that happen were intentional or at least their fault, TROS is a film with very little point or direction at all. There isn't much to dissect or analyze, so little of it seems to have had any thought put into it at all. It's just very tone deaf, like they really didn't realize how this would come off. People keep reading way more into the intentionality or meaning/themes of the film than I think there even is.

Not sure how they ever address the ST era/characters without damage control. I don't believe they will avoid them forever, but neither does it seem they want to own the direction they took, which is more despised than not, and which leaves little potential story left to tell, unless some of it essentially gets undone. But it does seem they realize the benefit of new, original stories that don't hinge as heavily on the film series, i.e. HR, Mando, any of the other TV stuff.

yeah, armband is overthinking it. It's a cool accessory, not a sign of this and that. remember that hilarious Soloist theory that Leia's 2 stone ring meant Ben and Rey, her children? Sometimes fashion accessory is just that.

Sorry but it still seems 'off'to me.
Fact is, I'd put nothing past them these days!

vaderito wrote:Enough with damage control. Own up to your mistakes. Make stories worth telling not because they are reaction to backlash. ST is a damage control trilogy that was created as a reaction to PT backlash.And then every single movie in the trilogy was a reaction to something. Stop reacting. Stick to your guns.

@vaderito

This 1000%.

Also, the essential problem here was that JJ is untalented and creatively bankrupt at his job as storyteller and director. You can do something watchable even while doing a damage control but no, JJ was doing his usual thing. A 2 hour trailer, Pick-Up-Your-Own-Interpretation and Cool-Scene-Driven story.

special_cases wrote:

vaderito wrote:Enough with damage control. Own up to your mistakes. Make stories worth telling not because they are reaction to backlash. ST is a damage control trilogy that was created as a reaction to PT backlash.And then every single movie in the trilogy was a reaction to something. Stop reacting. Stick to your guns.

@vaderito

This 1000%.

Also, the essential problem here was that JJ is untalented and creatively bankrupt at his job as storyteller and director. You can do something watchable even while doing a damage control but no, JJ was doing his usual thing. A 2 hour trailer, Pick-Up-Your-Own-Interpretation and Cool-Scene-Driven story.

@special_cases

Hear hear! I'm seeing it this way too nowadays.  

vaderito wrote:yeah, armband is overthinking it. It's a cool accessory, not a sign of this and that. remember that hilarious Soloist theory that Leia's 2 stone ring meant Ben and Rey, her children? Sometimes fashion accessory is just that.

@vaderito

My own view is that the arm band does have meaning.
It doesn't have meaning for the story in TROS, because well.... there is no story! Very little deep thought was given to anything. So I agree with vaderito on that.
But, for me it's meaning is that the armband is a blatant, intentional rejection of what TLJ and RJ contributed to the saga story.
RJ handed JJ gold to work with, and he turned it into dirt.

Anyway, I like to torture myself from time to time sneaking a peek at the star wars databank. Hope it's not tedious or annoying if I share?
Came across something I found interesting today. Looks like the entry for the legacy saber has been updated..
[ here: https://www.starwars.com/databank/anakin-luke-and-reys-lightsaber ]
Here's the main summary now:


and here's what it use to be:


The change in title is I think noteworthy - There's no longer Anakin, Luke and Rey - it's now just 'Skywalker'
The TROS content has been added further down but there's zero mention of the saber being buried. weird.

On the Rey page (yes so far it's still 'Rey' not Rey Skywalker, I'm bracing myself for that cringeworthy change) the burial of the saber is covered... here:
"Rey then traveled to Tatooine to bury the lightsabers of Luke and Leia in tribute to her mentors. Unveiling her own newly constructed Jedi weapon, she took the name Rey Skywalker."
[ here: https://www.starwars.com/databank/rey ]

I constantly feel like i'm missing something with TROS. I don't get the tribute to her mentors, and just find it pain dumb story wise.
How is it honouring them or the force, or the kyber crystal within, to randomly bury just them?!
Has anyone come up with a way of looking at this that they are happy with? If so, would love to hear it.

I think the decision to bury them is because they didn't want to have to deal with the legacy saber in future story telling, unless they need to fall back in OT nostalgia profits and have a character dig them up in the next trilogy - first installment titled 'The Rebirth of Skywalker' or something..
gah. I'm so salty when I look at TROS!!
They could have had Ben Solo live, and Leia's lightsaber called to him as it's new master.
And.. Anakin and Luke's lightsaber had called to Rey - she was connected through the force with the crystal, it helped her to find balance, it had some sentience (sort of/limited?), and just got buried?!
[I imagine the kyber crystal started calling out to broom boi to come and get it! haaaa]

Where else in star wars have we ever had a kyber crystal call to someone and then have that someone decide no don't want you anymore I've got another crystal?!

and most bizarre of all.. why am I looking at Star Wars like it's going to make sense anymore peeps??!!!  

I think we're living on dreams!
Let's face it, we want Ben Solo back, instead according to another thread they're giving us Rey Training Finn.
The further adventures of Dull and Duller.

DeeBee wrote:I constantly feel like i'm missing something with TROS. I don't get the tribute to her mentors, and just find it pain dumb story wise.

I fear you miss nothing, because there is nothing. No logic, no sense, no comprehensible story.
Only nostalgia fest for 40 year old dudebros and cringeworthy attempts to install and "explain" Rey Fakewalker.
I have given up months ago to search and find there any sense.

motherofpearl1 wrote: instead according to another thread they're giving us Rey Training Finn.

The gift nobody asked for.

Genuinely baffled by this 'mentors' stuff.
Rey's relationship with Leia always seemed 'forced' to me. Probably because CGI Leia will never be the real thing but also to I just can't get my head around Jedi Leia - she would never have given up her husband and political career to be a space nun.
And Luke was NEVER Rey's mentor. Daisy herself said that he was meant to be nurturing her, but instead it was Kylo. Another reason why her character being so dismissive of his fate in DROSS - TROS, sorry - - is so jarring.

I think the burying of the sabres had nothing to do with Rey, and everything to do with Abrams/Terrio/DLF telling fans that the saga of the real Skywalkers was at an end, just as Rey igniting her new lightsabre signified a new era. The Skywalkers are history. The way forward is Rey Fakewalker and her Acolytes.

The fact they aren't leaning harder into the Rey Skywalker renaming/rebranding is sure something. The main place I've seen it is on the wiki, and that's not officially LF, but an open source fan site. Like they know it's not good. Same with the Rey Palpatine thing. And they kind of ignore Ben's death most of the time too. Because what can you really do with that, other than make people upset?

Looking at the big picture, giving a non-blood Skywalker the Skywalker name was a huge burden to put on a new character given how attached the audience has become to the Skywalkers over 40 years. It's almost as if they tried to force the audience to transfer all their investment in the Skywalkers to one new character who isn't actually related to them.

Yes, the message of the ST is that your lineage doesn't have to define you and that's all well and good, but the reality is that family matters to most people. It's not everything, but it's still important.

It was just a risky....and dumb....decision.

Would have saved me a lot of time

That's it in a nutshell.
And, as many people have pointed out.....TROS ends saying it doesn't matter what your lineage is, TFA begins with Lor San telling Kylo
"You cannot deny the truth that is your family."

"Pick Your Own Interpretation" has been ST's mantra, at least JJ portion of it, and it backfired badly. Fandom not only got divided but 48% of audience that showed up for TFA was missing by the time of TROS. Point being, you can't expect people to get invested in something that they aren't sure if it's even there. Cause that's how Pick Your Own Interpretation works. Everyone is right. And that's not how audience enjoyment of the brand and ultimately brand loyalty work.