The Last Jedi

If you could have written the story to The Last Jedi how would you have changed it? I see so many comments and posts even 2 years since TLJ with people critizising it. Just Curious....

Interesting question. I'll try to be brief and in some kind of order;

Luke would have been lighter and more optimistic.

Rey would have been a lot more vulnerable and would have shown failure at some stage.

The entire Canto Bight sequence would have been removed.

Huxx would have been given some gravitas rather than be a comedy character.

The death of Han to Luke would have meant more and the interaction between him and Chewbacca improved maybe to reflect the scale of the loss.

Luke would not have been written as an aging tramp, who wanted to kill his nephew.

Leia would not have performed her space walk. I'd have her and Poe have the conflict. Not Admiral Holdo.

Admiral Ackbar would not have been killed off screen and maybe not killed at all !

Rose Tico simply would not exist. But if she had to then both her and Finn would not survive, especially Finn and especially given their actions put everyone else at risk.

The Adam Driver half naked scene would not exist.

Further to what Lee said, I'd like to have seen Poe's character actually have been fleshed out and used more. I thought he started out great in Ep7 as an amazing commander and pilot, but was relegated to a back ground character with no plot relevance in Ep8. Strange move given he is one of the new hero trio in the sequel saga. He felt wasted to me.

Having at least one or all of the bad guys actually being intimidating would have helped.

An ending that would feel like a cliff hanger. Something that would make me excited to see what happens next. The ending to Ep8 felt really lack lustre, a bit...meh!

It's a fair question, but I would push it further and rewrite from The Force Awakens onward, as I feel the whole sequel trilogy story line is fundamentally flawed. If I had been writing the story therefore, the basic outline / premise would be:

In the years since 'Return of the Jedi', a fledgling New Republic has been established after years spent battling the remnants of the Empire, which has now all-but disappeared. The mopping up was lead by Han and Lando who are both now senior figures in the Republic's hierarchy.

Luke has established the beginnings of a new Jedi Order, starting with Leia, who is now also a Jedi (Luke is doing what Yoda instructed him to and is actually passing on what he knows). The first new Jedi Knights are making their way out into the Galaxy, and it is two of these that will become the main protagonists of the new films.

The film opens with a small, beaten up one-man fighter being pursued and fired on by a hulking, overwhelmingly stronger ship. The fighter has been through hell, and is covered with scorch marks and battle scars. It does its best to evade the hail of fire, but eventually takes several hits and plummets out of control into the atmosphere of a planet, smoke and fire streaming from it. Seemingly satisfied, the hulking ship turns away and jumps into hyperspace.

Wipe to:

The story proper begins with our two new Jedi Knights and R2-D2 (assigned to accompany them on Luke Skywalker's recommendation after a troubling Force vision) being sent to investigate rumours of an unknown fleet massing in the extreme outer rim of the galaxy. As they near their destination, they encounter a planet unexpectedly strong with the Light side of the Force. It is the same planet we saw the fighter crash onto earlier. The Jedi detour to investigate and find Ahsoka Tano living there! She is now a fully grown Togruta, like Jedi Master Shaak Ti. The crash we saw was hers, but it took place 10 years ago. She has been living on the otherwise uninhabited world ever since, unable to escape since as her ship was too badly damaged and the communications array destroyed. Ahsoka had been on her way back to the Republic with terrible news when she was attacked. She too had heard rumours of a fleet of ships massing on the outer rim, but she had made the mistake of investigating it herself before reporting her intentions to the New Republic, so no-one knew where she was or what had happened to her. The news she had uncovered was that the fleet was actually under the command of a new and unknown Sith Lord, who had been biding his time and building a vast new fleet in secret until it was of a size and strength to overwhelm the New Republic's forces. In reality, much of the old Empire's remaining forces had also made their way to him, with only a small number of their ships being sacrificed to battle the New Republic to give the impression of resistance. The Sith Lord has been cloning new troops and his forces are on the brink of being ready to attack and dominate the galaxy.

The two new Jedi and Ahsoka race back to Coruscant to inform the New Republic's leadership of their discoveries, just as Darth Vengeance and his powerful young apprentice, Darth Rend begin their attacks.

Vengeance was a secret apprentice of Darth Vader's, who rose to fill the void after Palpatine's death. As his military forces start their attacks on the New Republic, Darth Rend will be sent by him to strike at the New Republic's heart by destroying the new Jedi Order by targeting the new and inexperienced Jedi Knights, which he starts picking off one by one.

And the story would advance from there. Luke, Leia, Han, Lando, Chewie, C-3PO and R2-D2 will all feature, especially in the first film, but (apart from the droids) will be mostly secondary characters as the torch is passed to the new principles (the two young Jedis and Ahsoka), who see most of the action. I could come up with more plot now, but since it's never going to get made and this isn't meant to be a novel, I will end it here.

I don't know how I would have done TLJ, but I know how I would start TROS, with Finn waking up and realising episode 8 was a really bad dream.

i deffo saw a different TLJ to others

failure of Rey
she was sent to find luke and bring him back. we had cues from Han and Leia that Luke wasnt going to respond to them. Rey failed in her mission, she didnt stick around for all his lessons and ended up slapping a legend. She found out that she was susceptible to turn to the dark side and still no answers about her parents. She went to turn Kylo, got slapped around by Snoke and gave away Luke's position. Silly and Naive at best.
The only bit of incredulous Jedi power was lifting rocks at the end. She also stole the sacred jedi texts.. thieving monkey. I think there is a connection between Rey and Ben which will unfold and be revealed in the last film.

Luke
considered for a space second to end his nephew when he saw the possible pain and suffering young Ben could be part of. The repetition of the dark side in his family was then lit by that moment.. I totally get why Luke hid away. He had failed his best mate and sister and then that destroyed the Jedi order... the weight on his shoulders could destroy any man.

Supposedly when Rey finds Luke in TFA, in some story treatments that was Luke contemplating suicide by flinging himself off the cliff. As he says himself, he had gone there to die and had removed himself from the force.

Last Jedi had too many unnecessary moments which people struggled with. As a fan of EU stuff I liked the movie because it didnt tick the list of a predictable tale. GL apparently hated TFA because it didn't do anything new, and thats why I have high hopes for 9..

I had hoped that TLJ would turn out to be a bit like TESB, darker and more confronting. Would have been nice seeing Kylo Ren chasing the Falcon in his Tie Fighter and having a real confrontation with Luke and Yoda. And what about the story of Luke trying to kill his nephew? It gives Luke away like an old, moaning man. A stronger, surviving Luke would have been better. Just like Leia, not floating like a modern Mary Poppins but arguing with Poe Dameron (I am not a committee!). Vice Admiral Holdo? Meh... Rose Tico? Iewww... DJ? Who....? Too many characters who don't contribute to a sound story. So story wrong (we are running empty on fuel?) and casting wrong.

My thoughts on TLJ:

OPENING CRAWL...

Poe fails...
Rey fails...
Finn fails...
Leia fails...
Holdo fails...
Luke fails ...
Snoke fails ...
Kylo fails ...

... Yeah we get it!

I suspect if RJ were to remake the original superman movie he would probably make Clarke Kent a paedophile to subvert expectations. TLJ did subvert my expectations, but only the expectation I had before I saw the movie that it was going to be any good.

So now the First order can track ships through hyperspace, which is a **** idea. The rebels don't know they can be tracked through hyperspace, even though that's how the imperials found their base. 10 minutes later the rebels seem to know exactly how this new tracking technology works. They have to disable the lead ship that is tracking them, so Finn and Rose go off on a boring mission that feels like some outtakes from the Prequel trilogy.

Meanwhile, General Hux overacts like a pantomime villain throughout, and Y wings are replaced by highly explosive rebel flying death trap bombers - which all fly incredibly slowly and in very close formation. What could go wrong?!

At this point the escaping rebels could fly off in different directions and take their chances. Or they could save a lot of hassle and just kamikaze into the enemy ship that they now know is tracking them (cos it turns out that doing this works). Instead there is a weird, dull, slow motion chase through space.

During most of the movie Poe will get told off a lot by someone we've never seen before with pink hair called Holdo. She won't tell him about her terrible plan which must remain a secret for no particular reason other than she thinks Poe is far too reckless/heterosexual. The plan is for the rebels to escape in secret on transports without the first order even realising (even though Snoke can see their ships through his f*cking window!)

Meanwhile RIan Johnson decides against watching the original trilogy to find out what Luke Skywalker's character is actually like, and instead writes another character altogether (less heroic/fun - these traits are not subversive enough!). Rey asks Luke for help, but no can do! Besides he has been really busy on the island looking after some old Jedi books and a sacred tree that he will burn later on in the movie.

Apparently Han and Leia are both terrible parents who allowed their son Kylo to be groomed somehow by Jimmy Saville Snoke during Jedi Scout camp (No need to explain how any of this happened though, as Snoke will die later on in this one).

Blah blah blah ... End with Battle of Hoth in the desert... credits roll. Everyone around me leaves the cinema in disappointed silence.




... ... But other than that I didn't mind it. :lol:

jayums said:

Blah blah blah ... End with Battle of Hoth in the desert... credits roll. Everyone around me leaves the cinema in disappointed silence.

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Great summation of this "cinematic masterpiece". :roll:
I've never walked out of a film, but my God, I was so damn close during this fiasco.
The creeping realisation that not only had the Sequel Trilogy soiled the eiderdown, it had sharted over the entire franchise.

Has to be the weirdest atmosphere I've experienced in a cinema, after a film has finished.
Complete silence. Just people exchanging "What the flying **** did I just watch" glances.
Unbelievable

Twin30mm said:

jayums said:

Blah blah blah ... End with Battle of Hoth in the desert... credits roll. Everyone around me leaves the cinema in disappointed silence.

Click to expand...

Great summation of this "cinematic masterpiece". :roll:
I've never walked out of a film, but my God, I was so damn close during this fiasco.
The creeping realisation that not only had the Sequel Trilogy soiled the eiderdown, it had sharted over the entire franchise.

Has to be the weirdest atmosphere I've experienced in a cinema, after a film has finished.
Complete silence. Just people exchanging "What the flying **** did I just watch" glances.
Unbelievable

Click to expand...

Will JJ overdo it this time with Episode 9? It sounds great: the Emperor returns, but it is at the same time more Old School than a fresh concept. JJ's Episode 7 was a sort of remake of ANH. So fingers crossed...

TLJ not only managed to not resolve any of the interesting questions posed by TFA (thereby retroactively making TFA a worse film than it was), but it also finished without leaving anything vaguely interesting for the last film to do.This film will have to almost start again from scratch.

Most heinous of all, TLJ managed to sully the OT. I now have to forget TLJ Luke who abandons his friends, and that Han and Leia's kid will somehow end up a) looking like Adam driver, and b) killing his parents for no particular reason other than being a bit of a spoilt brat. They all deserved better than this shitty ending.

I genuinely wished Spielberg would have done the sequel trilogy. It might not have ended up being particularly original, but I am sure I would give a **** about at least one of the main characters by the start of the third film.

I understand some people are well into the expanded universe stuff and I hope that various spin offs and things like the Mandalorian maybe best serve those groups. For me, Star Wars movies don't need to be subversive or have an overly convoluted plot. My mum should be able to watch SW and enjoy it. It needs to be fun, and the good guys need to win despite the odds being stacked against them.

I honestly never expected the sequels to be a patch on the OT. But I'm disappointed they couldn't have at least sketched out something beforehand that was actually worth making. It's amazing that there is so much that is creatively excellent in these films - technology, design, cinematography and music - yet the script is such utter dogshit.

I'm a sucker so obviously will go and see episode 9, but the sequels are dead on a slab and no amount of CPR in episode 9 is going to revive the stinking corpse.

jayums said:

TLJ not only managed to not resolve any of the interesting questions posed by TFA (thereby retroactively making TFA a worse film than it was), but it also finished without leaving anything vaguely interesting for the last film to do.This film will have to almost start again from scratch.

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This sums up my thoughts on what you said, Jay. :lol:

I am genuinely happy for those that enjoyed the film and are excited to see what happens next. I also wish I felt differently about it all, but it was all so lacking in the planning, plot and script that I just don't care about it. I will probably see it at some point, maybe even just wait to borrow the DVD of a mate out of morbid curiosity. But at this point it feels like all they can do to pull people in is scrape out whatever is left of the OT nostalgia barrel in the hopes of making a distraction so that people will be tricked into seeing it.

If Palpatine is back, or rather never died, doesn't that render the whole 6 film struggle watching the raise of tyranny, the decent of an entire galaxy into imperial dictatorship along with the Anakin following suit, then watching the redemption of Anakin and freeing of the galaxy somewhat all undone?

One of the most important aspects of a middle act in a trilogy is to leave us with a sense that our heroes are in a tight spot and us wondering how they'll overcome the obstacles before them. Empire gave us the very definition of that and ATOC left us as the galaxy was spiralling into civil war. When we left the gang at the end of TLJ we have an enemy that hasn't really ever got the upper hand over our heroes. The "Death Star III" was destroyed in TFA and Rey had bested one of the main villains...ergo the bad guys don't really feel like that much of a threat. In TLJ the main villains are a mix of Hux, who feels like a jumped up regional office manager, the kind of guy that you wonder how he ever got to be in the top position he's in as he seems so damn incompetent. Kylo who is still out done by Luke who didn't even have to show up in person to prove how inept he is, and is still at best a match to Rey and can't beat her. Then there's Snoke, who is outwitted by the guy who can't beat the main protagonist. So it just feels like the good guys are up against a bunch of incompetent cartoon villains that just shout and have temper tantrums a lot. They don't actually have the tactical intelligence to out whit the good guys at any point. Yet even that being that case, our good guys still find themselves scripted into a pickle. There's just no real tension or sense of struggle in this...that's assuming you don't count the 2 hour long, 5 mph space chase that seems tactically flawed and as about exciting as watching paint dry. :roll:

Like others have said, there are some fantastic visuals and cinematography in the ST, not surprising given the money behind it, but it's all a bit mutton dressed as lamb to me. After TLJ I began to think the best thing Disney could have done in creating new Star Wars films is to think very carefully about ****ing with the any of the characters that had come before, OT and PT. By all means create a new trilogy that follows after the events of ROTJ, but perhaps it would have been far better to just crate entirely new characters, worlds and events that have no real relation or tie in with Luke, Han, Leia et al. Unless...you were going to start the trilogy with the gang together handing the baton over to the new kids and let them go with it. I think Disney have tried to cater to everyone and created something mediocre as a result. Either go full on in honouring the OT or leave it well alone. This is why I feel the use of Palpatine and Lando this time right is somewhat disingenuous.

Still, for now I'm very much looking forward to the Mandalorian, Cassian and Kenobi series.

Just a thought...has anyone been thinking why the **** Rey automatically seemingly gets ownership of the Falcon? Why is Chewie still the co-pilot? He was best pals with Han, he had a life debt with him, they went through thick and thin for some ~40 years and then when Han dies , he doesn't take ownership of the Falcon!?!?!?! No, Rey gets it having known Han for all of a couple of days. Pffft! Rey should become the co-pilot to Chewie and Chewie says what goes with the Falcon. End of story!

This is how I would have changed it...

Phase 1 - First I'd have had a chat with Elon Musk, pay him some very good money and make a secret arrangement. Then get Ruin Johnson ( Rian lol ) bundled into Elon's Tesla car for the Space-X flight and send him out into the solar system.

Phase 2 - Fire Kathleen Kennedy for even suggesting that Star Wars needs to be more gender diverse ( no Kathleen, this is ****ing Star Wars not Starbucks, this isn't real life where everything needs to be fair, it's made up fantasy land sci-fi, concentrate on a good story ).

Phase 3 - Not go with a single bit of TLJ, NONE of it, scrap that ****. And then do TROS instead.

We should have got TROS as the 2nd film in this trilogy with a cliffhanger ending to carry onto an epic 3rd, plain and simple.

Hi all

I just wanted to share this with you.

This evening I watched a fan edit of The Last Jedi called "Last of the Jedi".


A HUGE improvement, no hesitations in recommending this to anyone who disliked Last Jedi.

It's not perfect, but is so much better in my view.

Leemcl said:

Hi all

I just wanted to share this with you.

This evening I watched a fan edit of The Last Jedi called "Last of the Jedi".


A HUGE improvement, no hesitations in recommending this to anyone who disliked Last Jedi.

It's not perfect, but is so much better in my view.

Click to expand...

It cant be anymore than about 7 minutes long :twisted:

CaptainAntilles said:

Leemcl said:

Hi all

I just wanted to share this with you.

This evening I watched a fan edit of The Last Jedi called "Last of the Jedi".


A HUGE improvement, no hesitations in recommending this to anyone who disliked Last Jedi.

It's not perfect, but is so much better in my view.

Click to expand...

It cant be anymore than about 7 minutes long :twisted:

Click to expand...

Do the two sets of credits take that long?