[Wilbur]

Heads up-there may be spoilers for ANY STAR WARS MOVIE!

Thoughts on "The Last Jedi"? I watched it a few days ago with the fam, and learned a few things:

• My family does not appreciate me laughing at it.
• It's an enjoyable "nonsense" movie.
• People are determined to love the new trilogy, no matter the cost.

I was pretty excited after hearing it was the most like Empire, but I feel like that's a bit of a stretch. I think where people get confused about this is some events are the same, but the story feels very different. There's also this need to best these moments, but I kept feeling like they did that at expense of the story.

Nonsense overview:

• The whole casino plot is...pointless. If you deleted it from the movie, you probably wouldn't notice. It had a very "podracing" feel to it. Add in the rebel decoder ring, and it felt like the point was to sell merchandise and Jedi training camp tickets.
• Leia goes "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon", despite being "Force Aware" but never using the Force.
• This is my favorite one, but at some point a guy licks the ground and proclaims, "It's salt!"
• NO ONE COMMUNICATES IN THIS MOVIE! Most of the middle bit is centered on Poe learning to be a leader, but I'm not sure he learns anything. Or that there's even a lesson to be learned. The only thing I learned is that both the First Order and the Resistance are constantly making the wrong choice.
• Rose prevents Finn from going kamikaze. She saves his life! So they could both be stranded in front the enemy.
• PPE is useless. If you're a main character, you'll inevitably survive spaceships exploding. Meanwhile, anyone wear stormtrooper armor has been transformed into wet tissue paper.
• Luke Skywalker drinks milk from a gross alien teat. HE DOESN'T CLEAN IT OFF FIRST! If Luke Skywalker was a homebrewer, every single batch would be infected.
• Every spaceship, uniform, etc. is a worse looking version of what came before.
• Episode 7 built Snoke up so much, but he's basically a loser.
• Rey never really trains, but suddenly becomes very good with the force.
• The puffins are the new, less offensive Jar Jar Binks.

Great things:

• The characters are pretty fantastic. They did a great job, especially the newer Resistance characters.

I'm sure I'll remember more, but the movie felt long and pointless. I honestly feel like if you stopped after the opening text crawl, you'd have just about everything you need for the last movie.

[Stevie]

Overall the story was fine, but I have some issues.
1- Red ninjas were dumb. Could have had a fight scene without it feeling like the Matrix.
2- Too many cheap gags.
3- Side plots felt like they were trying too hard to create new characters for more movies.
4- Hux became a total weiner in the end.

[dmtaylor]

Overall I enjoyed the movie a lot.  But there were a lot of problems too.  Here are just a few:

1) The entire casino plot line was stupid.  Delete!
2) The Rose character stuff was also stupid.  Wish they'd developed Finn's story line in any other way.
3) Bombs don't fall "down" in space.  They would just float around unless propelled in some manner.
4) Snoke wasn't tough enough.
5) Needs more Chewie!!  Just like cowbell.

I didn't mind the flying nun thing, I thought it was cool.  I remember telling my son immediately prior to the film, "I wonder if she'll finally show us something after all these years".  So it was like a fulfillment of prophecy for me.

The dark evil pit thing didn't make a lot of sense for me.  It had some echoes of Luke slicing off Vader's head on Dagobah, but not as awesome.

I loved the "can you hear me now" stuff with the red-haired dude.

Also loved the twist at the end, but... very sad that they chose to kill him off, as I believe the actor is too.  My guess is we'll still see a good bit of his ghost next time though anyway.

I am interested and concerned to see how they handle Carrie Fisher's real-life death in Episode IX, and I sure hope they don't over-CGI her.  ***SPOILER for those who haven't seen Rogue One yet (it is a FANTASTIC film, by the way -- you NEED to see it!)***: I can't help but cringe just a little bit whenever I see the end of Rogue One.

Decent movie, not perfect but pretty good.  I would like to see it again soon, maybe I'll pick up more stuff the second time.

Theory and Probably Spoiler for Episode IX -- do not read if you don't want to see my theory that I'm about 95% convinced is true -- it is a real doozy: Everyone in the audience seems too easily convinced by Kylo Ren when he tells Rey that her parents were worthless nothings.  I don't buy it.  My theory: They are twins, of course, Rey & Ren.  I'm not sure why or how Rey was discarded by mom & dad, maybe she was kidnapped or something, but being twinny would explain their strong connections and shared strength in the Force.  What... Kylo Ren never tells a lie now??  From other things I've seen and heard on the interwebs, I'm baffled how no one else has figured this out yet and presented this theory.  Perhaps it is just THAT obvious and doesn't need to be said out loud?  Sorry to all those who will be spoiled by this 2 years from now, that's how certain I am about this.

[Stevie]

The “I’ll hold” was fine, but they need to be careful or they will turn that character into Starlord. Nothing wrong with Starlord, we just don’t need another.

ETA - at at 19 days post release, I feel zero obligation to warn of spoilers. Those that complain had ample opportunity to see it and can deal with the consequences of their inaction.

[denny]

The “I’ll hold” was fine, but they need to be careful or they will turn that character into Starlord. Nothing wrong with Starlord, we just don’t need another.

ETA - at at 19 days post release, I feel zero obligation to warn of spoilers. Those that complain had ample opportunity to see it and can deal with the consequences of their inaction.

You paint with too broad a brush here

[Wilbur]

I am interested and concerned to see how they handle Carrie Fisher's real-life death in Episode IX, and I sure hope they don't over-CGI her.  ***SPOILER for those who haven't seen Rogue One yet (it is a FANTASTIC film, by the way -- you NEED to see it!)***: I can't help but cringe just a little bit whenever I see the end of Rogue One.

Loved Vader at the end of Rogue One. The best example of a Jedi BAMF without a bunch of flipping around.

Very sad that Carrie Fisher passed, and I know if was after shooting was finished, but I think they should have CGIed her death into this movie. I feel like it's going to end up as a throwaway scene in the next one, without the full weight deserving her character. There were also so many opportunities to do this-they could have swapped her and Laura Dern, and set up a great conflict for the next movie.

Theory and Probably Spoiler for Episode IX -- do not read if you don't want to see my theory that I'm about 95% convinced is true -- it is a real doozy: Everyone in the audience seems too easily convinced by Kylo Ren when he tells Rey that her parents were worthless nothings.  I don't buy it.  My theory: They are twins, of course, Rey & Ren.  I'm not sure why or how Rey was discarded by mom & dad, maybe she was kidnapped or something, but being twinny would explain their strong connections and shared strength in the Force.  What... Kylo Ren never tells a lie now??  From other things I've seen and heard on the interwebs, I'm baffled how no one else has figured this out yet and presented this theory.  Perhaps it is just THAT obvious and doesn't need to be said out loud?  Sorry to all those who will be spoiled by this 2 years from now, that's how certain I am about this.

My brother had the same theory, but if it's true, Han and Leia are literally the worst parents in the world. I like the correlation between Luke/Leia & Ben/Rey, but Luke was sent to live with his uncle. In this scenario, Rey was just abandoned on a desert planet. If it's true, it's another great example of rehashing the original in a more convoluted way.

[majorvices]

I am a genuine Star Wars geek, and I have been since the first movie came out. I have a Star Wars news feed in my inbox that I very often find more interesting than actual news/

The Force Awakens? Meh, just OK. I thought Last Jedi was awesome. It was fun and had me hooked from the beginning to end with genuine surprises.

Totally agree the Casino scene/CodeBreaker stuff was pointless and worthless and cold have been left out entirely (then maybe they could have focused on Rey actually training.)

There's not going to ever be a return to New Hope or Empire. Every Star Wars movie that ever comes out is going to find it impossible to live up to those movies. But this one was pretty damn fun. And the ending was awesome!