It might be worth it to regard TFA and TLJ as a single film.
Real sorry to hear about your shit there, man. Maybe this rebuttal will provide some diversion that isn't too boring. (Promises promises.)
- It's really well thought-out, but troubling at the same time because he seems to be a writer and the issues he enumerates shouldn't work against the film. In fact, for them. And by that I mean he should to be able to understand why things occur as they do.
- However, there are some mistakes. He contradicts himself by positing a solution to a "problem" using a hastily-written alternative. When he explains what HOW his alternative succeeds, he fails to realize he simply missed it. He also uses the word "rules" far too often.
- Lastly, Luke.
Space operas don't operate on rules, they operate toward story by the same principles as Greek or Norse myths. Sure there are superior options available, sure the laws of physics will be manipulated glaringly, yes a lot of it's not going to make sense when you step back from it. I think this guy understands space opera doesn't adhere to rules but does not care because he didn't like what he saw. My opinion is it's the wrong thing to think, that each event or outcome sets up a Rule in a space opera. A rule that says This Happened, therefore everytime circumstance dictates This Must Always Happen. The pitfall of the rule is how it retroactively affects the narrative, reshaping past events. Rules are not meant to be Reversals.
The bombers of STAR WARS are B-wings and Y-wings, therefore it is incorrect to introduce inferior technology.
Not only is that a bad rule this is a bad application of the rule. What if there were no available good bombers and they only had the shitty ones, could only spare the shitty ones? This writer seems to want lines of exposition explaining it along the way, rather than understand what's going on. He needs someone to tell him where he is in the story, but on his side he's like, "Because it doesn't make any bloody sense!"
The Space Opera question is: What does use of these shitty bombers serve to the story? One is that they are a symbol of film's theme of hubris. Created during the peacetime between dark uprisings, they are bloated and ill-equipped for not just this but ANY job. You don't like them, and IN-STORY the response is "What's to like? You never had to go to war with shit weapons?" Another is they're all they had, echoing the logistics in-story. We all know the film must portray our heroes in dire straits, but since bombs in space was too nonsensical the writer couldn't forgive the opening inciting action of space opera narrative. It's not the point to counter this guy's points point-by-point -- so much as adjusting
perspective so that the meaning and entertainment isn't lost.
The meaning of the bombers was to give a history to Rose, and provide a lesson for Poe. It's shitty. Maybe it's shittily done, but you get how beginnings must be dire for our heroes.
To question why the imaginary
XYZ isn't happening is to miss what does happen.
Tee video should know this, which should unshackle concerns like force fields, emplacements, air in space (museums or otherwise), bad tech, poor strategies being employed. Roll with these things, don't let them get in the way.
If you think it's stupid or looks like shit, that's all fair. But trying to insert reality physics into space opera is like trying to figure out how Loki tries to escape the gods by becoming a fish and when they catch him as a fish using fish-catching methods, he simply doesn't turn into something else and get away that way. Kids aren't bothered by this. That's why I hate the imaginary kid litmus test. It's always an adult that doesn't want to play ball.
Kids are like whatever, man, just show me something cool.
He spends times roasting each character over an open fire, opting against the Mythic Questions and opting to remain at the Rules Committee of Fouls, Gaps, And Holes Ltd..
Poe. He remixes the conversation to replace Hux with Tarkin. The dialogue he uses reveals his need for the film to spell out what he missed about the character. He needs Tarkin to say, "Your attempts at humor during this time reveal your weakness."
That's exactly right. That's the whole point. That's what Poe needs to realize about himself. And that's why he's joking with Hux (it's hubris) and why he perceives the admiral staff as being against him (hubris POV) and why he must learn to lead with his brain and not just his cockpit after everyone dies as a result of his bad plan and mutiny (hubrith HELLLOOOOOO). His weakness is the reason for all of the death in the rebellion. He wouldn't have believed Tarkin anyway.
This is lightly treated because, well, try using that terminology to a five year old wearing the porg beanie. No, the five year old already got it, without the horrific magnitude because the CHILD knows it's a STORY.
So excising the humor, what would they be talking about while Poe is trying to stall for time? That's within character? Or should they have used someone else to stall? Or skip straight to the one-man cavalry attack? He wanted more text crawl; he would. To me, it didn't seem all that egregious. Obvious and simple, sure, but funny and exciting without being too easy for the clever fox.
Snoke/Ren. The confusion of their dynamic is explained when Snoke reveals he's been grooming Kylo to be unhinged, which he used as cheese bait. Let's get that out of the way first. Now, let's go back to the beginning. Why would Snoke make a big deal about the ridiculous mask? He's fucking with him. Why would Snoke say conflicting things, making him all confused? He wants Ren to doubt his command. Why would Snoke risk losing Kylo through his nefarious deeds? He can see minds through space and bind bodies too. These are the Mythic Questions answered.
The Rules Questions don't really bother me. Like where they are in their training, and what's the dynamic between Hux and Ren. I get enough of their power dynamic as displayed, and I don't know how it serves the story to explain that Hux is a weak, obsequious ladder-climber who I believe is only there because he's Tarkin's nephew or someshit. (One contradiction being that the video needs certain things spelled out, but he doesn't bother with Snoke's run-down of Hux, in a line to Ren. Something like
I keep that that useless POS around because I can manipulate his proclivities [LIKE I CAN YOURS, BOY! LIKE I CAN YOURSSSS].) I don't need to see any further influences from Snoke than there already are, as they are happening onscreen. Hubris fells him, just as it threatens everyone in the film.
I'm kind of running away with a point-by-point analysis, and that's gonna do me no good. I go through all of this and I don't overlook the notion that, yes, the meaning and purpose of each even was understood and grasped -- it's just that he didn't like it. It's not a matter of comprehension, but of taste.
At this point I'm just trying to use examples of how not to let annoying questions impede reception. By looking into what these poor shortcomings, as they are so perceived, by what these shortcomings do in service to this Story. Not to the Rules. Two great tastes don't always taste great together. But maybe on purpose.
The Rules govern that Luke must be an altruistic Jedi of hope. And let's forget for now that he dies doing that very thing, and concentrate on this stranger we meet at the beginning:
Jake Skywalker.
Hi, Jake. I hear you suffer from a case of the Rules. Meet Luke. He's the real you, and he'll be joining us in this thought experiment. Standing right inside of you. The two of you will exist in the same place because neither of you are truly incorrect, and since everybody already knows Jake from this film and Luke from the others, we'll kinda focus on Luke in THIS film. Hope you don't mind. You're a good guy, if a bit gruff, and possibly given to bestiality.
Luke's been missing since however long ago a teenage(?) Ben nearly killed him. So he really hasn't been gone all that long, it just feels like it's been since 1983. So while Jake might have really been gone for a long time, Luke hasn't been hiding out for all that very long. In which case the depth of his hermitude isn't as great as we feared, which means he isn't masturbating as furiously may have been suspected by the mac&cheese sounds coming from through the door of our awareness. He isn't THAT emo. To prove this? Over the shoulder goes the lightsaber. Jake thinks he's deadly serious. He is not going to go back. The Jedi! They must die. Luke, on the other hand, knows this is the start of his inevitable return because, after all, he is Luke Skywalker. He's been on that island long enough. It's time to stop hiding. He'll strengthen Jake's petulant resistance, trying to compensate for the truth he cannot yet bear.
Make a display. Go away, sexless girl.
Luke through Jake doggedly goes through the motions of his life, ignoring the sexless girl. He can't, really, but it's easy to act like it. It isn't till old friends Chewy and R2 make him relent. But he faces her as Jake, who kicks this bullshit about how the Jedi must die. Jake is wrong. And that's the hard part about forgiving Luke, because it's hard to fathom Luke as wrong, or weak, or hopeless. But here he is. And why? you cry. What possible reason could there be for making Luke hide out for a decade and some change? Answer: Like you, Luke can't forgive himself either. He's simply
not himself. Not anymore. Maybe, never again.
But, not only is Jake wrong, Jake is a liar (doubly so, since I'm awkwardly and ham-fistedly talking about Luke, I case you missed it) -- it's not the Jedi he wants dead. Again, suicidal tendencies are not something you can easily discuss with the porg beanie.
Luke has had the propensity for suicide since EMPIRE. He's been a smarmy SOB since ANH. Whiny, petulant,
hard to teach.
But of course Luke won't quit and
in the movie Luke don't. And here is where two things collide. Rey is criticized for being OP without having earned it. Luke Skywalker is Ultimate RickRoll OP AF, and he earns that because he very nearly did give you up and for some of you let you down. We see the lowest point of his character and how he must find it within himself to become whom we already know him to be. It cannot be an easy journey, which would cheapen his death. If you want a character that peaks and peaks and peaks and goes out on a high note -- I suggest you watch a Peter North compilation video. What you want is porn. I don't want to see Luke chumped out at the end, do you? Given the Han?
Jake doesn't reduce Luke; he creates adversity. Forward propulsion into the story, not the history of what happened between films. As the history is being teased out like breadcrumbs, they are not to establish Rules and firmly root past plot points that never existed -- they serve the Myth of Luke Coming Back From the Brink of the Dark Side (without having to use heavy eyeshadow and a gay costume).
He's more Luke than he's ever been. Not just coasting on the oldie goldies but digging deep and coming back with mere seconds on the clock. I mean, to me.
As for shows I'm more of a trash tv guy, so I can only recommend WESTWORLD and this or that old show you've probably already watched, or else it's like IMPRACTICAL JOKERS and NATHAN FOR YOU and MTV CHALLENGE. Let me know if you have Movies Anywhere or VUDU, and I might be able to share my library of films with you. There is as good a sampling of my taste as anywhere.