Star Wars: Rise of Skywalker *****SPOILER THREAD*****

[GoktimusPrime]

That is Wedge in the turret, not Anthony Daniels.

You are correct, sir.

The middle of this movie is a macguffin quest, just like in TLJ. How is it better?

Because this movie's MacGuffin quest (amid the many other MacGuffin quests) actually contributes to the story. As I said before, this movie does suffer from having way too many MacGuffin quests, but at least they are all relevant to the story. Feels like a video game. The issue I have with the Canto Bite scene isn't that it's a side-quest, but that it's an ultimately irrelevant side-quest. Other Star Wars movies have side-quests too, and that's fine so long as they all service the story.

* Episode 1: while on Tatooine, the Jedi embark on a side-quest to help some slave boy and end up freeing him.
* Episode 2: Obi-Wan Kenobi goes on a side-quest to Kamino; finds a clone army. Anakin goes on a side-quest to Tatooine; finds his mother.
* Episode 3: Obi-Wan Kenobi goes on a side-quest to Utapau; kills Grievous, survives Order 66.
* Episode 4: Obi-Wan Kenobi goes on a side-quest to shut down the tractor beam power and confronts Vader. Man this dude loves side-quests!
* Episode 5: Luke goes on a side-quest to Dagobah. Meets a wrinkly green Muppet.
* Episode 6: Luke abandons his teammates on Endor to go on his personal side-quest to confront Vader.

Side-quests are fine. Multiple side-quests in on themselves aren't inherently bad (Avengers Endgame also has several side-quests in motion). They just need to be relevant to the story, and the test for that is whether or not the final outcome of the story would be any different if that side-quest never happened. What would happen if Finn and Rose never left for Canto Bite? Pretty much nothing. They still wouldn't have broken the First Order code. The First Order would still have decimated the Resistance fleet. The Resistance survivors would still have been forced to flee to Crait. The Battle of Crait would still have happened all the same. Nothing different.

And this was the big criticism about Jar Jar Binks in The Phantom Menace (and likewise Daniel and Wheelie in the Transformers G1 cartoon continuity). If you remove these characters and what they do, what would change? In TPM you could easily have re-written the story where Qui-Gon Jinn gives Jar Jar a Jedi communicator and orders him to go into hiding and to wait to be contacted by him. Jar Jar would obey as he has a life debt. The Jedi then take the Queen and her entourage to Coruscant but end up in Tatooine, blah blah blah, all the same stuff happens. Then when they return to Naboo, Panaka says that the Naboo don't have the manpower to retake Theed, so Qui-Gon Jinn calls Jar Jar and asks him to arrange a meeting between Queen Amidala and Boss Nass. The Naboo make the same alliance with the Gungans and the Battle of Theed happens in the exact same way. Jar Jar's entire presence on Tatooine and Coruscant are completely useless and could easily be removed without changing the outcome of the story. Contrast this with say Luke Skywalker's side-quest to Dagobah in The Empire Strikes Back. This would obviously have massive consequences on the story if it didn't happen. If Luke chose to ignore Obi-Wan, or if for whatever other reason, he didn't go to Dagobah or didn't find Yoda etc. -- everything would change. The Dagobah side-quest has consequence, the Canto-Bite side-quest does not. Sure, it does give us an interesting look into the machinations of society in the Star Wars universe; how the privileged live off the suffering of the poor. That's all interesting and stuff, but it's ultimately not needed when you're telling a movie story.

The original trilogy also mentioned the suffering under the Empire, but we didn't have to see it. The OT handled "less is more" quite well. Politics was mentioned or referenced but not directly witnessed, and quite frankly, we didn't need to witness it. The Prequel Trilogy was bogged down with too many talking heads scenes between politicians. Really? Who wants to see that? This stuff only needs to be mentioned in passing by other characters.
e.g. in A New Hope, Palpatine dissolves the Imperial Senate. That's a pretty big freaking deal! But we're not shown the Senate chambers and how all this happened. It's just discussed between an Imperial officer and Grand Moff Tarkin, and that's all the information that the audience needs to know. At most, this is the kind of stuff that you can include in an extended director's cut or something. Things that don't service the immediate narrative can be removed. And this is why Peter Jackson had to cut or change a lot of stuff from The Lord of the Rings when he adapted them as books, because a lot of it would have bogged down the narrative in the film medium. It can work fine as printed text, but with film as a time limited visual format, you need to adapt. I don't agree with all of Jackson's changes, but I generally agree with most of them. No Tom Bombadil? Good freakin' call!

[SharkyMcShark]

You are correct, sir.


Because this movie's MacGuffin quest (amid the many other MacGuffin quests) actually contributes to the story. As I said before, this movie does suffer from having way too many MacGuffin quests, but at least they are all relevant to the story. Feels like a video game. The issue I have with the Canto Bite scene isn't that it's a side-quest, but that it's an ultimately irrelevant side-quest. Other Star Wars movies have side-quests too, and that's fine so long as they all service the story.


...

What would happen if Finn and Rose never left for Canto Bite? Pretty much nothing. They still wouldn't have broken the First Order code. The First Order would still have decimated the Resistance fleet. The Resistance survivors would still have been forced to flee to Crait. The Battle of Crait would still have happened all the same. Nothing different.

Re: Canto Bite, there are two things to consider

1) It was meant to fail. It was a dogshit plan, that then failed and got a bunch of people killed, same as the plan to attack the Dreadnought at the start of the film. It's part of Poe's arc. He has to learn that you can't lead by flying by the seat of your pants. You can't lead on rash impulse. That might get you by as a fighter pilot, but it gets people hurt when you apply it to leading. As with Luke in ESB, the film bothers to show him and his plans failing. I'm not saying its my favourite section in any Star Wars film, but it has a purpose. Ironically, to say it was pointless and led to nothing is both to miss the point entirely but also kind of get it. It doesn't move the plot forward - in fact it hinders our protagonists. It absolutely moves Poe's character forward though.

2) It really doesn't take that much screen time up. It's literally two sections. The first is that they land and get chucked in jail. The second is when they escape from prison and free the planet. It's not like it's cutting back for forth for the whole middle third of the film.

[Miss Kitty Fantastico]

What would happen if Finn and Rose never left for Canto Bite? Pretty much nothing. They still wouldn't have broken the First Order code. The First Order would still have decimated the Resistance fleet. The Resistance survivors would still have been forced to flee to Crait. The Battle of Crait would still have happened all the same.

Not necessarily - the First Order only picked up the Resistance transports because DJ sold them out to save himself, which he wouldn't have been able to do if Rosefinn hadn't recruited him and then let him overhear Poe talking about them having cloaked ships. I mean sure somebody on the Supercalifragilistic might've thought to scan for cloaks anyway just in case (you'd think that'd be routine, but maybe once you've built a ship 60km wide there's not much left in the budget for repairing wear-and-tear on the scanners so they save money by just having a guy look out the window instead), but just from what's on screen it looks like Holdo's original plan (the one that didn't involve ramming) might've worked. Of course they'd still have needed somebody to come pick them up, but they'd have had more time to play with while the First Order chased an empty cruiser, and "Hey can we get an Uber?" might have gotten a better response from the Resistance's so-called allies than "Hey giant laser pointed at us and we're doomed, wanna come join in?"

...that's not a good look for Team Poe, granted, but they did make a difference.

Then again I feel like there's an argument to be made that if Poe hadn't gotten the Suicide Squadron annihilated bombing the dreadnought, it would've jumped after them along with the rest of the enemy fleet, and judging by the dialogue its autocannons could've blown away capital ships at extended range, since that's exactly what they were about to do over D'Qar before they asploded. That old line about the winner being the second-last person to screw up seems relevant.

[GoktimusPrime]

Re: Canto Bite, there are two things to consider

1) It was meant to fail. It was a dogshit plan, that then failed and got a bunch of people killed, same as the plan to attack the Dreadnought at the start of the film. It's part of Poe's arc. He has to learn that you can't lead by flying by the seat of your pants. You can't lead on rash impulse. That might get you by as a fighter pilot, but it gets people hurt when you apply it to leading. As with Luke in ESB, the film bothers to show him and his plans failing. I'm not saying its my favourite section in any Star Wars film, but it has a purpose. Ironically, to say it was pointless and led to nothing is both to miss the point entirely but also kind of get it. It doesn't move the plot forward - in fact it hinders our protagonists. It absolutely moves Poe's character forward though.

2) It really doesn't take that much screen time up. It's literally two sections. The first is that they land and get chucked in jail. The second is when they escape from prison and free the planet. It's not like it's cutting back for forth for the whole middle third of the film.

Not necessarily - the First Order only picked up the Resistance transports because DJ sold them out to save himself, which he wouldn't have been able to do if Rosefinn hadn't recruited him and then let him overhear Poe talking about them having cloaked ships. I mean sure somebody on the Supercalifragilistic might've thought to scan for cloaks anyway just in case (you'd think that'd be routine, but maybe once you've built a ship 60km wide there's not much left in the budget for repairing wear-and-tear on the scanners so they save money by just having a guy look out the window instead), but just from what's on screen it looks like Holdo's original plan (the one that didn't involve ramming) might've worked. Of course they'd still have needed somebody to come pick them up, but they'd have had more time to play with while the First Order chased an empty cruiser, and "Hey can we get an Uber?" might have gotten a better response from the Resistance's so-called allies than "Hey giant laser pointed at us and we're doomed, wanna come join in?"

...that's not a good look for Team Poe, granted, but they did make a difference.

Then again I feel like there's an argument to be made that if Poe hadn't gotten the Suicide Squadron annihilated bombing the dreadnought, it would've jumped after them along with the rest of the enemy fleet, and judging by the dialogue its autocannons could've blown away capital ships at extended range, since that's exactly what they were about to do over D'Qar before they asploded. That old line about the winner being the second-last person to screw up seems relevant.

Replied in the Last Jedi spoiler discussion thread to avoid further derailing this thread about The Rise of Skywalker.

[GoktimusPrime]

So... Rey's parents...

We know that one of them was Sheev Palpatine's child. Umm... huh?
If Palpatine had a kid then surely he would have either raised the child as a Sith or had the child killed; probably the latter. In the Original Trilogy it's stated that any offspring of Anakin Skywalker would be seen as a threat, which is why the twins' existence was kept a secret from Vader and the Emperor. And indeed when the Sith discovered the Luke was Anakin's son, Palpatine initially wanted him dead, but it was Vader who suggested and convinced the Emperor that Luke could be a powerful ally if he could be turned to the Dark Side of the Force. And even then, there was only ever two options for Luke -- become a Sith or die. Surely Palpatine would have at least held the same standard for any of his own offspring.

"Maybe Palpatine's child was raised as a Sith, but just like Finn and Jannah, s/he broke free of his/her brainwashing, then ran away. After which s/he got married and had Rey. Long after Palpatine's reported death, they started a family and lived together for a few years, but then when they discovered that the Emperor being resurrected and hunting them down, they went to Jakku and abandoned Rey there for her own safety. Then they were discovered by one of Palpatine's followers (Ochi) who killed them with that Sith dagger."
Uhh... sure. I guess that could work. But the film never explains this. For no apparent reason there seems to be a generational skip between Sheev's kid and Rey. Huh? That's kinda like jumping from Anakin Skywalker to Ben Solo and entirely skipping any real exposition on Han Solo and Leia Organa. Ya what?

Am I the only one who thinks that they might've been better off postponing the release of this movie by at least a year? Release it in late 2020 and allow time for the story to be better perfected. We know that we lost Carrie Fisher after The Last Jedi, so fans will understand and forgive just a single year time delay (and any who don't aren't worth listening to).

P.S.: Just watched the Rise of Skywalker Pitch Meeting video which is hilariously on point.

[Miss Kitty Fantastico]

I figured something similar. My headcanon at the moment is that Palpatine created his son (who for want of a confirmed name I've decided was named Steve Palpatine) in a lab - maybe 'born' mature, maybe just the project was started way back so by the time of RotJ he was a young man - and when Death Star II did what death stars do and it looked like the Emperor went up with it, some captive scientist lady they'd been forcing to work on the project who'd sympathised with the poor kid busted him out amid the general chaos of the fall of the Empire, and they ended up having a baby. It kind of explains to me how 'sell her into slavery' was Plan A for keeping Rey safe: despite loving each other and her neither of them were really very well-adjusted people (especially if Steve has been brainwashed from birth so he'd be really easy to goad into hating his dad so he could strike-him-down etc. and it was only the Power of Love that was keeping him halfway sane).

Palpy wanting to kill Luke I can understand - specifically it was "the son of Skywalker must not become a Jedi," that'd be more of a concern when he's hanging out with rebels and has the ghost of Obi-Wan dropping helpful hints in his ear, Steve in his secret prison controlled by the Emperor would be much less likely to suddenly decide to be a Jedi. Or perhaps the Emperor wanted Vader to bring Luke to him all along, and just ordered him killed initially so Vader would think 'saving' Luke was his own idea; that is kind of on brand for the Emperor.

I don't love the whole Palpatine's-granddaughter thing, in the theatre that was my most "Wait, seriously?!" moment. I can forgive it just because it doesn't seem really that crucial to anything - yes yes Rey's upset she may become Bad Rey, but the whole thing at the climax of the Emperor trying to turn her to the Dark Side and her being "nuh-uh gramps" totally felt like just something that happens in Star Wars anyway, I didn't feel like it was shoving the improbability of her being his granddaughter in my face in a way that took me out of the scene.

So we getting a Zorii Bliss spinoff? Her little wordless interaction with Poe at the end was magic. (I know she's got a bucket on her head, but it's a lovely bucket. That could be like a theme for Disney+ shows, everyone's got a helmet on. Maybe in the Obi-Wan series he'll be wearing a flight helmet with the blast shield down the whole time because he's honing his skills.)

[Autocon]

Saw star wars. Ending was very american hollywood. We all dead! No wait reinforcments have arrived last minute. It felt lacking in any different action scifi narrative as mentioned above.

Overall i enjoyed it. 6/10. Just a bit lacking in creative narrative.

[GoktimusPrime]

I figured something similar. My headcanon at the moment is (SNIP)

Herein lies the problem. Good stories don't require the audience to fill in massive gaps.

[SharkyMcShark]

I figured something similar. My headcanon at the moment is that Palpatine created his son (who for want of a confirmed name I've decided was named Steve Palpatine)

I was listening to the Weekly Planet review at the gym on Monday and they dubbed him Darren Palpatine, which almost caused me to drop a weight on my head.