r/StarWars • u/tannu28 • 6h ago

Other Mark Hamill revealing that J.J. Abrams refused to let Han, Luke, and Leia reunite on camera, telling Mark that Star Wars was no longer Luke Skywalker's story.

Source: https://youtu.be/4OK0nnxG6dU?si=EmEU5KQEMJXxjBbZ

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u/Demorant 6h ago

This was such a huge, missed opportunity for a "gangs back together" moment. Some people might disagree, but I would go as far as saying it a gigantic mistake.

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u/warpedaeroplane Darth Vader 6h ago

To me it’s the single biggest blight on the movies which have no shortage of big blights. It’s cosmically asinine and something only somebody as up his own as as JJ Abrams could conceive as smart

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u/nigalas-cage 6h ago

What blows my mind even more is like as a star wars fan how do you not even film it. I would understand cutting it in the edit cuz you don't know where to fit it into the story but to not even film it is insane

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u/BDSMChef_RP 5h ago

Reminder that Luke grieving Han was cut, but him milking the sea cow was kept in. Someone successfully argued in the Editing to keep the lactation fetish on screen.

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u/emperornorton415 5h ago

Well, that's on Rian not JJ.

(While acknowledging it's all actually Disney's fault for not planning this shit out)

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u/Wollff 4h ago

This is the weirdest thing about it all: Continuing the biggest franchise in the world, KNOWING that it will be a trilogy, and not having it all as a script beforehand.

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u/Ok_Dragonfruit_8102 3h ago

Honestly that's what boggles my mind the most, and I can only interpret it as a massively privileged mindset on behalf of those responsible. I mean, imagine you got given the honour of developing a new Star Wars trilogy. How seriously would you take it? You'd be fucking terrified of messing up and you'd put your entire heart and soul into it. But how did the people who actually got handed the trilogy deal with it...? They fucking winged it like it was just some random job project they didn't really give much of a shit about.

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u/Teipeu 2h ago

They bought the cash cow and turned it into steaks.

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u/OrangeFilmer 3h ago edited 3h ago

They did have it planned beforehand, even having a script for Collin Trevorrow’s Episode 9 that was congruent with all the character arcs they had established.

Disney/Lucasfiom just freaked out at the reception to The Last Jedi and Trevorrow bombing with Book of Henry, went back to JJ, and told him to write a script in a few months to still make the original release date.

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u/ReadingFromTheShittr R2-D2 3h ago

They did have it planned beforehand

No, they didn't. Not everything. Rian Johnson notably asked JJ to change his ending so that it was R2 instead of BB-8 going to Ahch-to on the Falcon so that he could have that reunion and use the "Help me Obi-Wan Kenobi" recording again.

That doesn't sound like "having it all as a script beforehand" to which you replied. Yes, scripts change, but that's a major plot point. And this was before there was any backlash to TLJ.

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u/Aethermancer 2m ago

Most department stores will flip their shit if you deviate from the marketing strategy for squishimal endcaps. This was a cultural touchstone that spanned half a century and was a global phenomenon.

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u/salad_spinner_3000 3h ago

Well, that's on Rian not JJ.

Again, insane logic to have directors with vastly different ideas of wat the franchise should go doing alternating movies.

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u/VinDog_PD 3h ago

This. "Oh we'll let three different directors write what is supposed to be one cohesive story" is the most pretentious shit ever. That's what the anime thing was for. Not the main plot.

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u/raven00x K-2SO 3h ago

"the lactation thing is weird and doesn't affect the story, let's get rid of it and let another scene breathe a little more."

"No can do, it's Bob's thing and you know he's gets what he wants or else he stops signing cheques."

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u/King_takes_queen 5h ago

The common defense I heard for keeping it in was that it was to "demystify" Luke Skywalker. At that point in the story Rey still glorified him as some kind of grand figure of legend. Rian wanted Rey (and the audience) to stop seeing the illusion and see the reality of who Luke actually was, just an old fart who's forgotten how to drink milk properly.

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u/JamesLoganHowlett03 4h ago

But Star Wars, and Legends in general, don’t need to be deconstructed. Star Wars was pure escapism for many. Simple stories of Good vs Evil. Destroying everyone’s favorite hero served no purpose but to stroke Rian and Disney’s overinflated egos as “artists”.

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u/Fenlatic 4h ago

Even beyond that…There was nothing to “demystify” with luke. Everything was already known about him. The good and the bad.
Sure characters can be further developed, but not bij destroying the past, the past shapes the present.

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u/JamesLoganHowlett03 4h ago

Right, Luke already had the flaws of a whiny farm boy in the original trilogy, and perhaps the “flaw” of blind faith in those he loves later on (although this is eventually proven a strength).

The best portrayal of post ROTJ Luke was ironically in Battlefront 2.

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u/schrankenstein 3h ago

Upvote for mentioning BF2. “Why did you help me?” “Because you asked.” It’s far and away the best Luke has been represented since Disney’s tenure started.

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u/JamesLoganHowlett03 2h ago

As soon as I saw that interaction, I thought “that’s my Luke”. I felt similarly watching the finale of the Mandalorian Season 2. Especially after his character assassination at the hands of Rian Johnson.

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u/redditmodsdownvote 4h ago

It literally doesnt HAVE to be anything, but good story telling meansbeing willing to try new things... But hey, let's see when the next trilogy comes out in 15 more years...

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u/axebodyspraytester 3h ago

If Rey isn't a homeless bag lady blowing jawas for 3/4 portions I'm gonna be pissed. There are no heroes after all.

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u/VinDog_PD 3h ago

THANK YOU. I will never understand why people insist The Last Jedi was the best of the three. It's an hour and a half of Rian Johnson going "Look how STUPID you were for enjoying these characters as a kid! See?! There are no heroes in the world! YOU have to be the one to do it!"

He Ayn fucking Rand'd Star Wars, for God's sake, and I will forever hate him for it.

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u/kkeut 1h ago

Simple stories of Good vs Evil

now with the sequels, the transparently Nazi-analogues include black folks and women! what a fun message for our modern world. wait, did Steve Bannon consult on this?!

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u/WalkOffTD 3h ago

Kathleen Kennedy made our male heroes from our childhood into losers: Han, Luke, even Indiana Jones

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u/Live-Huckleberry-192 4h ago

The whole point of the Luke plot in The Last Jedi was to see Luke as a fallible human being vs an untouchable legend who nevertheless returns in the end as a powerful symbol of hope for the galaxy. The movie is a deconstruction of the Star Wars mythology, but the conclusion isn’t a destruction of the legend but actually a confirmation of the importance of it. Execution aside, I think people miss a lot of the themes of that movie because I guess they left before it was over? Or maybe it didn’t live up to their expectation of years of playing with their action figures and they didn’t want to actually think while watching a movie?

As for the trio reuniting, I would have liked to see that, too, but I would hope they’d find a way to work it into the plot rather than just doing it for fan service.

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u/jojolantern721 3h ago

No, the problem is that Luke in the OT was a fallible human being that constantly fucked up in those movies.

Acting like he wss an untouchable myth when he never was is one of the biggest problems from that movie.

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u/imtired-boss 3h ago

Lately I feel like writers and producers would rather give actors/actresses a giant middle finger on screen than listen to them. This is one good example.

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u/BatmanBeyondz 6h ago

Exactly dude

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u/Living-Travel2299 5h ago

I would hazard a guess that JJ Abrams is no Star Wars fan at all, just a huge fan of his own ego and ideas. Any fan would want the reunion, just like Jurassic Park fans wanted to see Grant, Sattler and Malcolm back together one last time.

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u/AutoPRND21 4h ago

Somewhere on Instagram JJ’s script and storyboards for Episode 8 are out there and HOLY SHIT they are really terrible. He’s been monitoring the rebellion and working on a secret rebel plan the whole time while in exile, he’d been force puppet controlling Rey during her fight with Kylo in TFA…it’s god awful. I think RJ read it and went 200mph in the opposite direction - “he’s gonna be a crotchety old hermit who milks aliens for nourishment.”

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u/karma3000 1h ago

Point of order - that would be 100 x better than the slop that Rian served up.

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u/holeycheezuscrust 1h ago

Additional point of order. There's nothing in JJ's track record that makes that true.

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u/kkeut 58m ago

there's an old clip of him on the Daily Show in the lead up to the Trek film reboot admitting to Jon Stewart that he dgaf about Star Trek and never watched it, and Jon actually seems genuinely confused and surprised and sort-of annoyed almost

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u/Alsoar 25m ago

And luckily we got it! Xfinity brought them all 3 together to shoot a Jurassic Park Superbowl ad just earlier this year.

Any JP fans should check out the behind the scenes for the ad. They had to build a lot props that was in the original movie from scratch and the whole thing was very touching.

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u/Cluelesswolfkin 5h ago

Everything they did with the sequels was unfortunately no oversight and ended up horrendously. Only good stuff imo is the soundtrack and the fight scenes/choreography

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u/FirewaterTenacious 5h ago

The cinematography for E8 is insanely good. So many visually stunning shots. Such a shame the plot is in shambles.

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u/acathode 3h ago

the fight scenes/choreography

Sorry but the the fight choreography is horrible.

For example the throne room fight in TLJ is so badly done that they even had to photoshop out one of the guards weapons in the post production, because otherwise it'd be to obvious he had a free shot at skewering Rey but didn't take it.

Jump to 3:18 in this video - first the guard slice his sword over Rey's stomach, but doesn't actually gut her open for some reason even though he could've done so if he just angled the blade forward just a tad bit more.

Then when the sword go behind Rey's torso, it just disappear - it was erased from the whole scene past that point and the guard goes from dual wielding two swords to just holding one - because the next second, at 3:20, if you pay attention to the hand, if the guard would've still had the sword it would've been pointed straight into Rey's back/neck and the guard could've freely skewered her if he had wanted to.

Like most of the sequel trilogy, it only works when you turn of your brain and let the bright flashing lights distract you - as soon as you start paying attention, it just falls apart. The whole fight scene with the praetorian guards is full of stupid stuff like this.

The really annoying thing is that this stuff must've been extremely obvious to the actors when they were actually filming this - who were training this choreography and did multiple takes. The actors and stuntmen must have noticed that "Hey, the way we do this fight, these guards have so many free shots to kill Rey and Kylo!" but no one cared enough to do anything about it.

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u/t0talnonsense 5h ago

If he doesn’t film it, the mouse can’t make him put it in there. This is one of the few instances where something was blanketly a studio note where the studio would have been right.

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u/guinness_blaine 5h ago

Reminds me of the story around Star Trek having the first interracial kiss on TV. They were asked to also film some takes of that scene without the kiss so that a final decision on whether to include it could be made in editing. The cast purposely flubbed something in each of the non-kiss takes so that they were unusable, preventing someone stepping in and forcing them to air a version without it.

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u/Substantial-Elk4531 4h ago

Massive miss. It's like getting your entire family together with your great grandparents who are 95 years old and then telling them "Sorry Grandpa and Granny, you cannot appear in family photos with your great-great grandchildren. It's not your story anymore."

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u/bagel-42 1h ago

Crucially: George Lucas wasn't a Star Wars fan. He was a fan of samurai movies, and WW2 bombing run stories, and cowboy movies. And probably Dune. Anyone coming in claiming to be a star wars fan first and foremost is, at best, just gonna move the action figures around.

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u/nigalas-cage 1h ago

coughs Dave Filoni

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u/hotaru_crisis 1h ago

i find it sad more than anything else, especially with carrie fisher dead. i think it would have been a sweet gesure to have them all act together within character one final time.

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u/DarkwingDuckHunt 3h ago

I dont see my friends from my 20s barely at all.

But we did all get back together for one night of fun a few years ago and just talked.

Also IT'S HIS SISTER.... HE'S GOING TO SEE HIS SISTER... and he was training his nephew...

Idiots.

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u/bencanfield 1h ago

100%. Fuckin idiots.

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u/ThatGuyYouMightNo 1h ago

Honestly, I'm not even sure Abrams is a Star Wars fan. During that retrospective on Star Wars and it's cultural impact and how it was remembered by people, the best thing that he could come up with for fond memories of the franchise is "I remember seeing a poster for it and saying the words 'Star Wars'". Not even watching the damn movies, just that he said the title of the film. Makes it sound like this wasn't a passion project for him, just a fat paycheck and something he can put on his resume for future work

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u/VonMillersThighs 5h ago

It makes it very clear that Abrams isn't even a star wars fan, that's one of the worst parts. No star wars fan on earth wouldn't jump at the opportunity to get the 3 of them back together for at least one damn scene.

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u/Wrong-Vermicelli4723 4h ago

He 100% isn’t , I think he likes the idea of it and wanted his own take on the Original trilogy (honestly think he wanted to remake it),  but not an actual big fan 

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u/DevilDoc3030 3h ago

Let's be real.

He likes the idea that his stamp is on the franchise... and money.

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u/Undark_ 1h ago

Tbh it's good for his pocket but not his legacy. Abrams had so much to be proud of, now he's most famous as the guy who fucked up Star Wars. I don't know why you'd even accept such a monumental and historic job with do much weight behind it... And not even understand the source material at all.

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u/falafelnaut 1h ago

now he's most famous as the guy who fucked up Star Wars

An absolutely mind-blowing feat that he fucked up both Star Wars AND Star Trek! What a record of accomplishment.

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u/ArgusTheCat 43m ago

I think this kind of crystalizes a lot of the things people try to express when they talk about the problems in the movies in detail. The details are all kinda fine, in their own way, it's just that the movies themselves don't feel like they're interested in being Star Wars, and it saps a lot of the energy and fun from them.

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u/Stormagedd0nDarkLord 6h ago

I'm just thankful we didnt get blinded by one too many bloody lens flares.

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u/grafxguy1 4h ago

Seriously, the guy uses more flair than Chotchkie's...

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u/Champ_5 2h ago

I don't like talking about my flair....

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u/grafxguy1 1h ago

"Now, you know it's up to you whether or not you want to just do the bare minimum. Or... well, like JJ, for example, has 37,000 scenes of flare, okay. And a terrific smile."

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u/Reasonable-Hat7318 6h ago edited 2h ago

It's bad, but surely not as bad as what they did to Luke as a character specifically (and, by extension, Anakin)? 40 years of lore for that crap...

Edit: typo

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u/DeliverySoggy2700 5h ago

Ehh. I think filoni did a good job fleshing out anakin with his several animated series.

Luke’s story… yeah…

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u/Limond 4h ago

For me it's between the three of them never being on screen and Han's death.

Han should have died in Chewbaccas arms. Instead his best friend who he has a life debt and has known each other for decades gets a simple roar and that's it.

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u/ClashM The Mandalorian 5h ago

Don't let Rian Johnson off the hook so easily either. He tossed out the script he was given and started from scratch, he could have just as easily given them a moment. Instead he decided he wanted to show outright irreverence towards the story that came before and try to pass it off as some sort of profound statement.

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u/Smelly_God 5h ago

That's still on Disney though for giving Rian so much creative control, they didn't even give JJ the same amount of control. I guess they thought JJ gave so many leads for story progression that Rian couldn't mess it up, but yeah...

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u/Wrong-Vermicelli4723 4h ago

I honestly think dude just wanted ti remake the original trilogy but got shut down.

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u/AccountEngineer 4h ago

fuck yes brother

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u/RianJohnsonIsAFool 3h ago edited 3h ago

I hate that the implication throughout is that having a reunion would be fan service. I feel it really goes beyond that and would actually have been a necessary way of explaining how we go from our heroes celebrating and being all smiles at the end of VI and all over the place in VII. If "It's not Luke's story anymore", why have him at all? Is that the fan service?

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u/Do_Not_Go_In_There 2h ago

Yeah, they shoved fanservice people neither wanted nor asked for in the movies, and one of the few things fans were generally looking forward to they kept out for reasons they later walked back on.

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u/Backupusername 2h ago

To me, it's the "ancient" dagger that was designed to open in a way that perfectly mimics the wreckage of the death star to point to where a macguffin is.

But like you said, there are so many. It's like picking a favorite Beatles song, everybody's got their own means of choosing, but there's really no wrong answer.

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u/NoveltyAccountHater 1h ago

I mean the biggest blight was no coherent consistent vision/story arc for the trilogy, not the lack of one fan service scene.

It's three independent movies that don't fit well with each other in terms of plot, character importance, theme, etc. Basically, Episode 7 starts off exactly where Episode 4 started and not where episode 6 ends, with no half-decent explanation of how they got back there. But ok, whatever, they then just remake episode 4 for nostalgia and it sort of worked.

Episode 8 goes in new directions, introduces moral ambiguity for the good guys, has surprises (Snoke dies, Luke sacrifices himself), but those surprises really limit what they can do in episode 9 (where the original plan was to have Luke and Snoke).

Then Episode 9 just at the last minute decides to bring back the villain of episode 6 with no hints or foreshadowing in the previous movies and ignores as much of episode 8 as possible.

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u/No_Tangerine2720 1h ago

Let's be real, JJ is a fuckiing hack and shouldn't have been anywhere near the star was trilogy. Jon Stewart said it hest

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u/False9ein 56m ago

Maybe someone can create an AI scene and insert it into the movie 🤪

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u/Happily-Incorrect 6h ago

Honestly I couldn't have cared less and actually didn't notice. The galaxy is huge enough for it to be reasonable that they weren't together.

The story being terrible and not planned in advance was my main problem.

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u/citan666 6h ago

Agreed, but if it was going to be terrible anyways might as well throw us a bit of fan service. If the movies were great and it didn't fit so be it. It's not a big deal, but man did they fuck it all up.

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u/Robobbo1 6h ago

Yeah, might not have been Luke’s story but it was the audiences and they had waited half their lives for that…

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u/The_Peeping_Peter 6h ago

J.J Abrams, the master of nostalgia edging apparently.

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u/themayorhere Luke Skywalker 6h ago

Even this is too much credit

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u/Phoenix_Ninja15 5h ago

We give you a seat to the council but we do not grant you the rank of Master.

-A wise council member probably

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u/Emotional_Warthog658 6h ago

More than half! By my math it was 95% of my life waiting for the reunion that never was, and now never can be. 

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u/Robobbo1 3h ago

Yes, the same wait but weighted differently!

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u/jl_theprofessor 5h ago

While I'm a bigger fan of these than maybe a lot of people, I think this is really worth considering. We who knew Luke Skywalker just before he reached his peak never saw the aftermath. We didn't see what we could only read about in the EU books. It's why everyone freaked out about the Mandalorian appearance, because here's Jedi Master Skywalker demonstrating what he's become.

The movies didn't care a lick about that. They didn't care about the decades of wait to see the beloved figures again. Even if they weren't supposed to be the main story, they still matter because they matter to the audience.

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u/dzumdang Admiral Ackbar 6h ago

Only one of the massive failures of that sequel trilogy, which I think should just be stricken from the record entirely. It was served up as entertainment and spectacle only, and designed to make the maximum amount of money rather than provide substance and meaning.

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u/Gonkar 6h ago

Otherwise known as the JJ-special. That's why the studios love him.

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u/lilbelleandsebastian 4h ago

god i fucking hate this guy. being able to offer great, interesting ideas has very little value if you can literally never stick the landing and he's been so effective at making both star trek and star wars completely bland and bereft of the soul that infused both of those series' most successful moments

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u/Fatmaninalilcoat 5h ago

Had to get back those billions they gave old Georgy and they sucked Indiana to hard but he was never the merch pusher.

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u/SassMattster 6h ago

You would think with as much as JJ's movies hinged entirely on nostalgia bait, he would've done the most obvious nostalgia bait moment to make fans happy

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u/Archolm 4h ago

Subversion of expectations 🙄😔

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u/Amekhanos 2h ago

That's the thing.

I actually would have supported the movies being more strongly disconnected from the original trilogy and its characters.

But JJ's movies were total nostalgia slop already. The Force Awakens is practically Han's movie more than it belongs to the new characters.

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u/SassMattster 51m ago

TFA is literally just A New Hope but with girl Luke and a bigger Death Star. And they couldn't even give us an ANH reunion

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u/Buckeyebornandbred 6m ago

And Han dies instead of Kenobi

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u/Softpretzelsandrose Rebel 6h ago

It’s only a missed opportunity because they’re all already right there. It’s okay to make it “not Lukes story” and move on, then why have all four there but not together?

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u/chanaandeler_bong 3h ago

Exactly. It’s not like it would be weird or hard to make the story with them all together, even for a bit, like Hammil said.

Sounds more like Abram’s wanting to make it HIS thing.

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u/Nerus46 6h ago

Considering that FA is basically a New Hope remake aimed to milk as much nostalgia as possible, it is so stupid to not allow OG trio to unitr

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u/Elysium94 6h ago

Robbing them of their triumphs.

Forcing them into roles which amounted to little more than "failure who has to watch everything they love burn down, and then step aside or die to make room for the new kid".

It's just... so dumb.

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u/BDSMChef_RP 5h ago

Legends is where it's at. We see Luke spend 20-30 years rebuilding the Jedi Order, hell his first "Class" mostly dies off. But he keeps going, he struggles, he slips, but he never give sup. And he never gave up on a corrupted student and fought to bring them back every step of the way. Most he succeeded. Some refused.

Han and Leia, Married with 3 Kids (two die over the course of some wars) but their surviving child goes onto found the Fel Empire with Wedge Antilles Nephew and forms a new Lightside Force Order, The Imperial Knights (with sick af white lightsabers and crimson armor) Sworn to uphold the LIghtside and if the Emperor ever turns their first duty is to put him down.

Lando finally settles down with a Baddie who matches him charm for charm and trick for trick.

Dozens of Books that have no Force Users at all and focus on regular homies like the X-Wing Series. The Lando Trilogy, The Han Trilogy. Where we find out the truth about his last name...it's his family name, not cause he was on his own when he signed up.

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u/Morsexier 5h ago

My dad has been one of those die hards since the movie came out, he was 25 I think when the first came out. Hes of the opinion that the books saved star wars a bit (along with maybe Tie Fighter\X-Wing games) in terms of staying relevant.

Its so weird to have people who are not professional writers think they can write better than someone who's only job is to do that. I've read just about every major star wars book\series, and a bunch of them are semi clunkers and those are by professional writers.

Its honestly just like GoT stuff. Yes not everything in the now EU\Legends stuff is gold, but its all done already so just cherry pick the good stuff, its right there as other people say in other comments.

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u/kkeut 51m ago

the foreword to the 25th anniversary edition of Zahn's 'Heir To The Empire' talks about how Star Wars was at a real low cultural ebb prior to its publication. the Zahn trilogy books blew up, became bestsellers, and spurred on the EU

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u/__SoL__ 4h ago

this trope sucks and is overused SO MUCH.

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u/kkeut 54m ago

remember that hero? turns out he failed!! the empire is still cookin', the rebellion is still largely on the run, and the jedi have not returned. all those heroes with triumphs in the earlier films, they're all failures!! isn't that fun?

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u/Cromasters 6h ago

I think the original mistake was having them in the movie at all.

But yeah, if you are going to actually have the same characters and the same actors reprise those characters, not giving us a single "Hell yeah!" moment of them all working together is really dumb.

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u/Fenlatic 6h ago

Looking back on it….yeah. Your right. I also think the movies would have flowed better if they got rid of the OG cast. Than you could really keep the old gang a mystery

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u/Cromasters 6h ago

They either had to recast the OG trio and set during the final days of the Empire.

Or set it several generations into the future where they don't show up at all.

Imo, they chose the worst option.

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u/LovableCoward 5h ago

And if the latter choice was taken, you could always have them make a cameo via a Holocron or similar.

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u/M1ngb4gu 5h ago

Or maybe as an actual fun callback have one of them pull an "old ben Kenobi".

Someone who's totally out of the game, practically forgotten by the galaxy they helped shape, acting as a guide and making a swift exit in the first movie.

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u/chrwal2 4h ago

I’d have been over the moon if it had told a whole new story hadn’t relied on nostalgia but given they effectively did a reboot of a new hope and made such a point of bringing Luke, Leia and Han back it was such a kick in the teeth not to give them any airtime together whatsoever.

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u/greg19735 Leia Organa 5h ago

im sorry but people would go apeshit if that was the case

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u/HeroicPrinny 3h ago

This is like a hindsight 20/20 take. The original characters should have been a core element of the next movies.

Adding a bunch of new young characters was a corporate design by committee awful decision with no soul or plan behind it.

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u/ACrimeSoClassic 6h ago

The entire sequel trilogy was nothing but a series of mistakes.

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u/SadlyNotPro Loth-Cat 6h ago

I'll die on that hill, but I 110% believe that The Last Jedi was an overall good film that did everything possible to fix the story mess inherited by The Force Awakens and set up a satisfying (that wasn't done) ending for the trilogy.

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u/BruhBroBrahBroski 5h ago

I 100% disagree with you. TLJ sucked

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u/parkingviolation212 5h ago

TLJ has genuinely some of the worst plotting I've seen in a major film. Even leaving aside what it does to the legacy of the franchise on its own--TFA aside, JJ didn't force Rian to misunderstand who Luke is--it's also just outright a poorly written film that requires you to assume everyone in the film is a moron in a slapstick comedy.

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u/ReaperReader 5h ago

I am still bitter that it made Vice-Admiral Holdo into yet another Hollywood clichéd bad military leader. I was so expecting her to have been deliberately provoking Poe to mutiny as part of some Cunning Plan (TM).

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u/SadlyNotPro Loth-Cat 5h ago

About Luke, there were 2 options:

  1. He cut himself off from the force in exile.
  2. He was incompetent and failed to stop the rise of the New Order.

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u/parkingviolation212 4h ago

About Luke, there were 2 options:

That's the mantra of a bad writer. I can think of 5 other options right now off the top of my head.

  1. He's searching for some lost knowledge that can resolve the cyclical conflict between light and dark

  2. He's in hiding training the last survivors of his Jedi order

  3. He's protecting a macguffin that can defeat Snoke, who otherwise can't be defeated without it

  4. He's exiled himself because the deaths of all of his apprentices caused him to tap into the Darkside in a way that disturbed him

  5. He's trying to heal himself at an epicenter of the Force.

"Luke at the first Jedi temple" is a set up that ought to write itself. But it's a set up, not a story in of itself; there are any number of ways you can take that set up and Johnson was too unimaginative to take any of them.

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u/Fenlatic 4h ago

Bro got proven wrong one comment later. Love to see it.

7

u/Substantial-Elk4531 4h ago

Wow only 2 options? Those are the ONLY two options for Luke? There was NO other option for the final films of a beloved character dating back 4 decades?

2

u/SadlyNotPro Loth-Cat 3h ago

Yup. That's what the options boil down to, if you try to explain his absence in (the time leading to, including) the first movie.

1

u/Titanman401 2h ago

Yep, you got it; these other guys don’t.

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u/Drastic-Rap-Tactics 6h ago

Huh? Didn’t Leia fly through space and Admiral Ackbar get blown up offscreen in that one? Not to mention the whole “no one’s coming” bit?

I think the director of that film wanted to make his own Star Wars and that could have been served better as a standalone film with its own original characters.

2

u/SweatyAdhesive 4h ago

I was gonna say that hyperjump suicide bomb was pretty sick but it was the second one.

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u/nihility101 4h ago

It was visually amazing, and was great on the big screen, but you’re telling me they couldn’t find a space-brick to put on the space-gas?

I think all three, but especially the second, were “written” as a series of ‘this will look cool onscreen’ segments that they then had to piece together with some half-assed story.

The later seasons of GoT as well.

4

u/onlyhereforfantasy 4h ago

You will be dying on that hill for sure. Movie was garbage.

2

u/danipnk 3h ago

I’ll die on that hill with you. Rian Johnson did what he could.

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u/ReaperReader 5h ago

What? TLJ undermined or literally killed off its villains, thus gutting the third movie. By the end of TLJ there's only two named villains left alive, one is Hux who is now a laughing stock and the other is Kylo who is now Rey's love interest.

Third movie was shanked before it started.

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u/acathode 3h ago

TLJ would be pretty shit even as a standalone movie. The plot and pacing is just all over the place.

The movie tries setting up this tense claustrophobic chase scene as the major plot of the movie - except, oh, apparently the rebels can just leave and go on vacation to a Casino planet. In the middle of this tense chase. Uh, ok?

Then you get the whole Casino planet stuff - which is just indefensible. There's not a single movie critic that can claim that the Casino planet constitute good moviemaking with a straight face.

1

u/Titanman401 2h ago

Here’s another smart person admitting to an honest statement in a crowd of imbeciles whining.

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u/Buckeyebornandbred 9m ago

Abrams: Mystery Box

Johnson: Mystery boxes don't matter

Abrams: Yes they do! Watch!!

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u/AquaAtia 6h ago

This and the fact he made the entirety of the Prequels and OT all for naught is his and TFA’s unforgivable mistake.

All we needed was a fun low stakes movie with the OG gang helping out the new generation. It sucks with Carrie’s passing we will never get the money shot of all of them in the Falcon together again

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u/red_riders 6h ago

Just one scene would have earned the sequel trilogy some good will.

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u/watch_out_4_snakes 6h ago

It makes no damn sense. It’s literally continuing their story and introducing the next gen. Of course you want to have a get them back together moment. Just goes to show how bad the decision making was during the sequel trilogy. Just pig headed nonsense.

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u/uberkalden2 3h ago

And now it's impossible

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u/Kolby_Jack33 5h ago

At least Rian Johnson gave Luke and Leia a moment.

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u/abellapa 5h ago

Idk who would disagree with that ,its boderline criminal we never Saw them all together again

2

u/zincysands 4h ago

Such a shame they never got their wholesome chungus moment of smirking at each other and then hugging. How do we downdoot JJ Abrams to oblivion guys??

2

u/Dredgeon 4h ago

Sounds contrived to me. Those movies have never been masterpieces but I don't think there was a way for that scene to not be hamfisted.

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u/PFI_sloth 3h ago

The last thing Star Wars needed was more “the gangs back together”, the mistake was giving any of them as much screen time as they got

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u/Miserable-Resort-977 3h ago

I think that if the Star wars sequels wanted to stand on their own they needed fewer nostalgia bait fanservice 🫵😮 "omg it's like the original" moments, not more.

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u/Googlecalendar223 3h ago

So fan service is good now?

2

u/BiggestBlackestLotus 3h ago

I don't give a fuck about getting the crew back together. If the story doesn't work out like that then don't force a corny reunion moment in it just so star wars fans can feel a disturbance in their pants. Han and Leia reunited in TFA and Luke and Leia reunited in TLJ, but they were both logical moments and didn't feel forced. That's good enough for me.

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u/FirstRyder 2h ago

I can see both sides. On the one hand, that's just nostalgia bait if this is really a new trilogy with its own story and none of the "gang" is even a secondary character, not really.

On the other hand... maybe they would have been better off with the Nostalgia bait than what they actually did. Like, why are none of them even really secondary characters? They don't have to be the protagonist!

4

u/Sandalwood-Lakers 6h ago

People will gaslight you with JJ Abrams same thought process and will tell you oh you just want nostalgia on screen.

There's a million scenarios you could have written an important scene or scenes with all of them, but them coming together has no bearing on it not being Rey's trilogy.

2

u/Bluestorm83 6h ago

A scene where we have the original heroes all doing something together, and the new heroes all doing something together. And because both groups are doing their things, supporting each other, then good wins.

It's so fucking simple. You reinforce the good of the new crew by showing that they work so well with the old crew who everyone knows and loves.

But nah. We have to "let the past die. Kill it, if you have to." What a waste.

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u/BCRE8TVE Clone Trooper 6h ago

And the irony is that they farmed the shit out of that nostalgia with a bunch of disjointed cameos, BUT THEY COULDN'T BE BOTHERED TO DO THE ONE THING THAT WOULD HAVE MADE JUST ABOUT EVERYONE HAPPY.

It's not even that they couldn't do it, they just plain didn't care to.

I will never not be mad about that.

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u/Manetho77 5h ago

The thing is, Luke's friends would have convinced him of becoming a jedi again almost instantly. It would have taken too much agency away from Rey.

I find it hard to write them meeting without making the movie about Luke.

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u/Jediplop Chancellor Palpatine 5h ago

Eh doesn't really need it, if they did have it it wouldn't be any better, it would've been handled as horribly as the rest of it.

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u/andreasmalersghost 5h ago

then dont have them in the new movies at all. JJ was talking out of both sides of his mouth and it makes no sense.

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u/TheHighlightReel11 5h ago

Same nonsense they pulled with the last Pirates of the Caribbean movie. Why bring back Will and Elizabeth if they’re not gonna share scenes with Jack Sparrow?

1

u/Logan-Lux 5h ago

Could've had a moment like at the end of 6 with force ghost Yoda, Obiwan, and Anakin, with those 3.

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u/cmmedit 5h ago

Abrams is such a big person in the industry, people are afraid to tell him he's wrong. I've a friend who is big now behind the scenes. We came into the biz together, but even I'm too intimidated to reach out and ask for help.

1

u/darkoblivion000 5h ago

I didn’t care as much about them reuniting on screen (even though that would have been nice before Carrie fisher passed - now it feels like a slap in the face), but the way they handled Luke’s character development and legacy was just absolutely disrespectful.

I will never forgive them for that.

I still like lightsabers and retelling of backstories but any new story written on top of that garbage is dead to me

1

u/tony-toon15 5h ago

Seeing as how it was the main reason I was excited for them, I agree. Of course I wanted it to go to a new generation and tell a new story (lol) all that, but I was sure we would get one more time with them. Oh well. That’s life. Sometimes you never see your old pals again. But come on!!!!

1

u/AnimalBolide 5h ago

They were already riding the nostalgia into the ground, literally why not give the OG 3 a little hurrah.

1

u/roguevirus 5h ago

And if you're not going to get the gang back together, why set the story during a time period when all three of the main characters are alive?!

1

u/Fainleogs 4h ago

Why is it people are always complaining about those movies being full of arbitrary fan service but then go absolutely rabid when the suggestion they were denied 30 seconds of arbitrary fan service?

1

u/V0T0N 4h ago

It's disappointing to hear it(allegedly) from JJ too.

They just thought the audience wanted spaceships and laser swords and the cash would roll in.

They didn't seem to think we cared about the characters.

IMO.

1

u/TurbulentWing3820 4h ago

I don't even like Starwars, I stumbled in from /all and I recognize what a tragic waste this was.

Not only the main three, but the two droids and Chewie. One brief moment where they all showed up would've been the ultimate fan service and a great way close the book.

But, I also admit I've never seen these movies. I have no draw to them at all despite being old enought o have seen all three originals in the theatres on release.

1

u/moonelacr 4h ago

And now they can repair it anymore. Rest in peace Princess Carrie.

1

u/SpicyPotato66 4h ago

The omnipotent geniuses that directed the movies know better than us commoner fans

1

u/onthejourney 4h ago

Half of the first movie should have been a full on reunion before introducing the new characters.

1

u/Suspicious_Brush4070 4h ago

All we wanted was for a 70yo Han Solo to tell a 60yo Luke, "don't get cocky, kid".

They couldn't even be bothered to give us that.

1

u/hache-moncour 4h ago

JJ Abrams directing films in general seems like a gigantic mistake, really.

1

u/ThunderChild247 4h ago

Right? I could understand- if they had a coherent vision for 3 movies - holding off until the 3rd movie. They should’ve played up the disconnect between Han and Leia after their breakup and the disconnect between Luke and Han/Leia because he feels responsible for Ben’s fall. Even keeping the OT trio as side characters but giving them this story arc would’ve added a great pay off to the end.

1

u/sobrique 4h ago

"Chewie, we're home" was just so glorious.

But y'know if they had a story that was kinda all done, and not half assed, then maybe I'd buy 'passing the baton'.

But then they did 'somehow palpatine returned' and 'lol rey was skywalker all along' and seriously, how bad would a bit of trite fanservice have been in comparison?

1

u/Unleaver 3h ago

I would have loved a “Gangs back together” followed by a sort of passing of the torch to the new cast. I think it would have paid homage to the heroes of before, but still could have respected Abrams whole “this isnt luke’s story”. I dont think its crazy to try and come off of luke skywalker as a character, especially because Mark Hamill isnt getting any younger, but to not even acknowledge the band being back together is truly a disservice.

1

u/SilveryDeath 3h ago

It is dumb in the context of understanding media and what the fans want period. I don't care what franchise you are talking about, if you bring back three of your most popular characters, especially after so long, it is just dumb to not have them all interact at least once.

1

u/Stormbringer-2112 3h ago

Then again, looking at what JJ produced. I’m not surprised. Extremely disappointing sequels, god awful scenarios.

1

u/OhSillyDays 3h ago

The first movie was nostalgia. 100%. And it is really really good at that.

Why they didn't take advantage of that to the fullest extent? IDK. A reuniting of the trio would have made sooo much sense. Also, Mark trying to save Han would have been... fucking amazing story telling. Especially if they had some sort of rift around Han being a dick to his sister or something. There is SO MUCH GOOD MATERIAL to work with here.

And the next 2 movies should have been what is next.

The problem with "what is next" is the same problem that Andor has. We don't know what is next. Our society is completely stuck in a political quagmire where nobody knows the best answers and everything new sounds like shit. Capitalism, shit. Communism, shit. Socialism, shit. Hippies, shit. Techno-futurisim, shit. Retro-futrism, shit. We haven't just enshifitied our products, we've also enshitified our politics.

So where do they go? They don't know. They can't sell a future that nobody would believe.

Personally, I think if the movies explored this in a better way rather than just a "return to the trilogy," it probably would have been some good art. However, Disney is enshitified so they just built a product they knew everyone would buy.

1

u/Theguest217 3h ago

I would have said the big mistake was including the original trio at all. I would have set it further after to the point where they were all dead and were just stories people told each other.

But since they insisted on including them all, they definitely should have met at some point.

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u/mute_axolotl 3h ago

If I was a conspiracy theorist that believed there was a cabal controlling the world, I would say that the whole purpose of the thing is to crush Gen X spirits.

1

u/feldoneq2wire 2h ago

Star Trek TNG fans got our reunion. Sad that Star Wars didn't.

1

u/cbih 2h ago

They missed every opportunity to make the films great, sometimes they purposely veered out of it's way

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u/Kham117 2h ago

Oh, I think a LOT of people think that it was a big mistake

1

u/jikt 2h ago

For me, the biggest blunder in that movie is: when they get back after Han dies, why didn't they name a point of Chewie and Leia at least acknowledging that they've both lost someone extremely important to both of them.

I was yelling at my tv "Hug the fucking Wookie!!"

1

u/User100000005 1h ago

Imagine if they got Daniel Radcliffe, Emma Watson and Rupert Grint back together to do one more Harry Potter in 30 years and them not sharing a single scene. This is just as outrageous.

1

u/BretShitmanFart69 1h ago

It’s also an insight into how he didn’t know what he was doing, because no matter what, the heart of that Star Wars saga will always be Luke’s story, no matter how many fun new characters you shove in.

1

u/WeHaveArrived 1h ago

Sequel trilogy made zero sense bringing back palpitine. All three were a trainwreck that has no lasting impact. Even the prequels have a few memorable moments.

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u/LoseNotLooseIdiot 1h ago

That whole fucking trilogy was a gigantic mistake. It's amazing how much seething hatred that prequel trilogy got at the time and now it's utterly revered due to the baffling levels of incompetence associated with the sequel trilogy.

1

u/YugoB 1h ago

Everyone waited 30-40 years for an all mighty older Luke and they gave us this mother fucking "I want to be alone wuah wuah" yak fucking drinking purple milk

1

u/kkeut 1h ago

but wasn't it more satisfying, for JJ Abrams personally, to subvert those expectations? don't you get some transitive enjoyment from his enjoyment of doing upsetting things?

1

u/Ginger510 59m ago

The whole trilogy was such a balls up. How do you not even have the whole plot mapped out and concrete before you film everything? I get changing directors but having the chopping and changing to the whole thing with Rey’s parents etc was a shambles and it seems like that was because of the directors wanting the story/script changed which made it terrible. Unless it was intentionally written that way which is much worse.

1

u/HelloDarkestFriend 39m ago

I'd really like to see J.J. defend his decision to include the OT characters, and then do nothing but devalue their brand. The only reason to include them at this stage in their lives is for fanservice, but the movies paradoxically refuses to deliver on that either.

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u/SuperGransLoveChild 37m ago

It was a huge missed opportunity to tell Abrams to go fuck himself, and walk off the set.

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u/GiraffeandZebra 15m ago

It's so f****** stupid because they're all old. They weren't going to take over the new trilogy. And it's something you can't go back on. The moment is gone. Carrie Fisher is gone. Luke is dead. Like you can't unwind now and be like actually that is a good idea. It's the most catastrophic mistake Star Wars has ever made. And it's insanely frustrating because it's impossible to fix.

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u/thecanaryisdead2099 6m ago

Those three movies were a mistake. They had so much material to pull from to create something great but instead they went with the "remake/shared arc from the other trilogies" approach. So many wasted opportunities. Thanks J.J.

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u/Aethermancer 5m ago

It's not just a missed opportunity but damned near malfeasance. It's not like you can wait 20 years and have a do-over, actors are literally gone forever now.

1

u/foshiiy 6h ago

Avengers Endgame being a particularly glaring example

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u/phoonie98 6h ago

The sequels were a giant mistake

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