About Star Wars 8..;

The last interview I know he gave was when he admitted that he had not much knowledge about SW and was more or less through with it. Finding his balls was still probably too drastic, I meant that he was not interested about the topic of SW in general and so this reaction quite surprised me.

Before, my argument was basically limited to "the prequels were uniquely bad, and comparing them to the new trilogy is ridiculous on its face." However, I recently saw episode VIII, and I really liked it. It's the first Star Wars movie I actually positively liked since the original trilogy (and  honestly I'm kind of lukewarm even about episodes IV and VI). I was surprised at how much I liked it. In that vein, a more thorough response:

Rey was no one special

That's the point. A small, elderly green alien living on a hut on a remote planet can be a Jedi master; a slave boy on Tatooine can be the most powerful force sensitive in the galaxy; a country bumpkin can be the heir to the Jedi prophecy. "Size matters not" and neither does lineage. Episode VIII subverts audience expectations about Rey's background in order to make this well-worn point. It's intentional and thematic, not a lazy "fuck you" to episode VII.

Khylo Ren's background isn't explained in detail

True. The original trilogy (IV-VI) also left some questions unanswered:

-How did the Dark Side tempt Darth Vader?
-What exact experiences did Obi Wan Kenobi and Darth Vader share together before, during, and after the fall?
-How did Yoda become such a great Jedi master?
-What was Princess Leia's exact political function on Alderaan and in the Rebellion?

etc. etc.

However, none of that background was necessary because we could infer the missing pieces given the way the characters acted on screen. We didn't need to see Obi Wan and Anakin palling around because Obi Wan's dialogue gave us what we needed to understand the relationship. Likewise, Khylo Ren has a consistent, compelling arc that makes sense given the sketches of background we have about him:

At his core, Khylo has daddy issues. We may not know exactly why he was tempted by the Dark Side, but it isn't important. The key is that Han and Luke both fail him, Snoke abuses him, and by the end he probably feels deeply rejected and inadequate. This explains his violent insecurity as well as his worship of Lord Vader. The point isn't some mystical connection to the sith; it's an attempt to 1) identify a new father in Vader, and 2) to create an invincible Vader persona that can shore up his insecurity.

However, episode VII strips away that protective shell. After being beaten by an untrained girl, he feels and looks ridiculous in the Vader get-up. To cope, he has to grow past the suit and imaginary fathers. When he rejects Snoke, it is emblematic of a more general move towards independence--to a place where he will find validation in power alone and not from any master whatsoever. Getting rid of the Vader get-up and rejecting Snoke is not a fuck-you to episode VII; it's the logical development of Khylo's character from desperate teenager to jaded adult.

Whether or not you find that character compelling is subjective. I liked it, others didn't, and that's fine. However, if you didn't like it, it's probably not because of a lack of backstory. Even without backstory, the characterization is, objectively, present, and it does follow a logical arc.

Complaints about Phasma/Snoke

You know who else didn't have a deeply involved in-film backstory? Emperor Palpatine in the original IV-VI trilogy. He was just a cartoonish villain with over-the-top dialogue who could shoot lightning out of his hands. And that's all he needed to be.

The main players in this trilogy are Khylo Ren and Rey. They get character development, backstory, and screen-time as appropriate. That stock-villains over-hyped by the internet did not receive the same attention may be understandably disappointing for some, but it is not some major objective flaw, nor does it prove that the film makers were somehow incompetent.  

Princess Leia

If the Force can let people come back from the dead as space ghosts, project themselves mentally across light years, and generate literal lightning from their hands, it can produce mild forward acceleration in the vacuum of space. If you thought the scene was corny, that's your prerogative, but I enjoyed it, and it's silly to argue that it doesn't make sense.

But it didn't have action

This is a false claim. The movie had action. It had space battles and land battles and super weapons and light saber fights. To my eye, at least, it was all competently choreographed and shot. It did not have a prequels-style kung fu fight, but that's a very specific thing to make or break your Star Wars experience.

And ANYWAY, I don't buy that this kind of action is essential to Star Wars anyway. The Empire Strikes Back had less action than any of these movies, and it's generally considered the best of the series.

Sylvie, babe, the argument regarding Rey is that she has absolutely NO reason at all to be as powerful and gifted with the Force as she was without training on a level that surpasses Darth Vader before his defeat by Obi-wan on Mustafaar. Everyone else you mentioned had a reason to be who they are, Rey did not. She was a child to non Force sensitive junkers that was abandoned by them and happened to be super ultra Force sensitive herself, unlike Anakin was literally conceived as a manifestation of the Force without a father and had the potential to be the strongest Force user in the Galaxy.

The point is that Rey is a Mary Sue character who was given no reason at all to be what she is and didn't deserve it whatsoever. I'd have rather actually preferred Finn of all people becoming a Jedi, at least he was an interesting character in this mess of a rehash.

Rey is a Mary Sue

1) I don't want to call the Mary Sue argument sexist, but it makes it hard when you call me babe

2) A Mary Sue is not a character who has super powers; it's a character who is so thoroughly flawless that their very presence kills the tension in the story, since they can do no wrong and cannot fail.

I actually kind of agree that Rey was like this in episode VII. She was kind of too good at too many things for no good reason, and it did make the story kind of predictable and stale. Every problem in the plot was resolved with "but then Ret overcame the obstacle by trying a little."

However, that's not the case in VIII. Virtually every goal she tries to accomplish ends in failure, including her search for a comforting story about her parents, after long and painful effort. That the Force chose a nobody to give super powers is irrelevant because her super powers don't prevent her from struggling, failing, and growing.

In fact, I would argue that giving Rey a super secret bloodline connection to Skywalker would make her MORE of a Mary Sue. Think about the fan characters: are the bad self-inserts more or less likely to have a cliche secret connection to the canon heroes?

3) You're still ignoring the main point: the whole point is that ANYONE can be a force sensitive hero. While that is a change from the prequels, I don't see why it's a bad change, especially since if anything it is a return to the spirit of the original trilogy. Why is that a bad direction to take the mythos?

Hm, how do I word this:
*I have no problem with Rey not being a Skywalker or Windu or whoever. It would have been nice, but it is no must.
*The action itself was ok. The bombing run was nice, the dogfight was also nice. The flaw that a single light suicide cruiser can destroy a whole fleet of other, partly heavy cruisers is quite severe in my eyes. This basically negates the military progress of the Empire if the alliance is sinking low enough to depend on suicide runs.
*The fight between Phasma and Finn is a joke. You could think Finn has no combat training after all which is kind of surprising as he is a former Storm Trooper. The fight between the two jedi and the guards makes not much sense but it was nicely choreographed.
*The miniature death star technology is either a massive exaraggation of either the kind of technology used to miniaturize it or the death star has lost massively in firepower. Pretty sure the AT-AT could have made short work of the door too, nobody but one guy showed up to help them anyway. If you have not thought it through, leave it out. It was in hindsight probably more of a a suicide dive again plot foil that should have started the obligatory shitty love plot inheritent to many SW movies.
*I also widely agree with the character of Ren. Still that does not qualify him as the menacing and charismatic leader of a big organization, it qualifies him to be a powerful dork with attitude problems. Good thought out character but the wrong place in the story. Still your interpretation gives me some hope that SW9 will be novel at least.

It is an ok movie, I both laughed and was anxious to see what would happen next at some passages. But it just was neither novel or the kind of SW movie I would have liked to see.

Harrier wrote:*I have no problem with Rey not being a Skywalker or Windu or whoever. It would have been nice, but it is no must.

Glad we can agree

*The action itself was ok. The bombing run was nice, the dogfight was also nice. The flaw that a single light suicide cruiser can destroy a whole fleet of other, partly heavy cruisers is quite severe in my eyes. This basically negates the military progress of the Empire if the alliance is sinking low enough to depend on suicide runs.

I had the same thought in the theater. Like why haven't they weaponized this technology? Just take a hyperspace engine, attach a lot of something heavy to it, and fire it at the death star.

*The fight between Phasma and Finn is a joke. You could think Finn has no combat training after all which is kind of surprising as he is a former Storm Trooper.

Phasma was wasted potential, I agree. She had a really cool visual that was hyped up in marketing, but she got squat even by the standards of stock villains.

*I also widely agree with the character of Ren. Still that does not qualify him as the menacing and charismatic leader of a big organization, it qualifies him to be a powerful dork with attitude problems. Good thought out character but the wrong place in the story. Still your interpretation gives me some hope that SW9 will be novel at least.

I agree--but I also think the movie is aware of this. General Hux doesn't want to take orders from this kid and won't until he's being Force choked to death. The rest of the First Order falls in line presumably because:

1) They're in the middle of a battle. Even in real life, the chain of command changes radically and messily when commanders die, and it's not until the dust is settled that people ask questions. The Emperor is dead, but the fight is still ongoing, and Ren fills what would otherwise be a complete mess in command structure.

2) The First Order below the admiralty has been genetically and psychologically conditioned to take orders from loud Force users, regardless of their identity. I imagine Kylo knows how to make them magically pliable much like Snoke.

However, I have a hunch that Ren's leadership isn't going to go unquestioned in episode IX. If it does, then yeah, that will probably be a flaw. My suspicion, though, is that Hux and his friends are going to mutiny the first opportunity  they see.

In fact, this opens up a very cool opportunity for a more calculating Admiral Thrawn style character to emerge in opposition to Ren's pure power :3 That's just speculation, though.

*The miniature death star technology is either a massive exaraggation of either the kind of technology used to miniaturize it or the death star has lost massively in firepower. Pretty sure the AT-AT could have made short work of the door too, nobody but one guy showed up to help them anyway. If you have not thought it through, leave it out. It was in hindsight probably more of a a suicide dive again plot foil that should have started the obligatory shitty love plot inheritent to many SW movies.

Again, though, is this a bigger logical flaw than giving the Death Star a critical weakness accessible to an X-wing with a photon torpedo? It's transparently an excuse to set up a climactic final action set piece, which is sort of a flaw, but not a big one in Star Wars.

I sympathize with Acuya's point here. All of your points individually make sense, but they're sort of nitpicky and beside the point about what really matters: the characters, the theme, and the mood of the piece. These are like Cinema Sins errors--superficial. They don't explain the larger "I HATED THIS MOVIE" reaction so many fans have.

(Also, I actually thought the romance was really cute, but I suspect I'll change my mind about that eventually, so I won't press it <3)

It is an ok movie, I both laughed and was anxious to see what would happen next at some passages. But it just was neither novel or the kind of SW movie I would have liked to see.

This is fair.

Here's an exercise that might be interesting:

Harrier and Cy (and potentially Person), would you be willing to list things you liked about episode VIII if I gave a list of things I hated?

Sure.

*I liked the porgs. They do not take much room, give an absolute cheesy but glorious impression when Chewbacca grilled one and the one imitating chewie was great.
*All non close combat fight scenes.
*New AT-AT looked good.
*Ren unable to fire at Leia.
*Ren offering an alliance with Rey.
*The power difference between Snoke and Rey/Ren.
*The actual method of killing Snoke. He surely did not see that coming!
*Mind link.
*Luke projecting himself through the Galaxy.
*Badmouthing and at the same time ignoring the general. Classic troll move.
*I liked the reverse Lando Kalrisian traitor.
*Master Yoda.
*R2D2 playing the ancient message of Leia for Luke.
*The sharp intellect of the captain of the first big destroyer and the realization that he has got got when the ship goes boom.
*Finn as spineless coward.

That list is quite long, no doubt. I am also indeed a bit nitpickerish in general, but i like when the small things work in general.

I'd like to weigh in on Rey

Spoiler:

BOOM! Mic drop! Caboose is deep and he liked the movie! FITE ME! And to those signing a petition to erase this movie from canon. I think they are stupid! Unless anyone on here did it...you are excluded from my comment!

Wolf's Opinion

Spoiler: