General Star Wars Thread

Again, it sounds like a dumb fanfiction. I'm pretty sure there's a lot of fanfics with that exact plot.

There are also plenty of proper sequels that have the old hero having retired and settled down, and Luke's case for doing so is enhanced by the fact that force powers and love don't mix.

edited 3rd Apr '18 8:57:10 AM by Sigilbreaker26

Personally I'm not much a fan of that trope.

I mean, if you want to say "I personally don't like heroes going off and having normal lives post-adventure" then sure, but that's not by itself an argument for it being dumb.

I'm personally not a fan of the trope of the "old hero who turned into a grumpy bitter cynical old man who needs to be guilt-tripped back into action," and yet that's exactly what they did with him here.

Frankly I find Luke giving up being a Jedi for love/a family more believable and consistent with his character than I do him just giving up and suddenly deciding that the Jedi suck just because one thing didn't go his way.

The Jedi do suck though. Like, a lot.

Personally, I'm actually fine with both of these. Luke Skywalker is a complex character. Literally both of these are in line with his OT characterization.

Also, just gonna throw this out there (again): Luke didn't try to kill his nephew. However, Luke thinking about it to save the entire galaxy is totally in line with what the previous movies have established thus far; both regarding Luke's character and the Skywalkers as a whole.

No they don't. They fight for nobility and justice throughout the vast majority of time we see them, even at great personal cost, and their biggest failure in the PT is more the result of political decay from the Republic than their actions.

The Jedi don't suck so much as they can't be relied on to clean up the rest of the galaxy's mess when it resolutely determines to destroy itself. Heck, they even came a hair's breath from nearly defeating the plan when Mace beat Palpatine.

Luke came very damn close to stabbing his nephew - he was able to barely restrain himself, which is not behaviour that is predicated on his original character nor would it be something he would pick up as a result of spending a few decades as a Jedi master.

If Luke had saw the signs of darkness in Kylo - then tried to focus on the good in him and therefore ignored the sword of Damocles, which would later bite him in the ass - that would have been a much more consistent way for all the pieces to end up where they were. It would have been one of Luke's previously established traits turning out to be a flaw.

edited 3rd Apr '18 9:28:54 AM by Sigilbreaker26

> The Jedi do suck though. Like, a lot.

Apart from Yoda,the others are morons

Okay I should clarify: not saying the Jedi as a group all collectively suck, I mean as individuals, a good lot of them are assholes. I buy the philosophy, I just don't dig some of the people who practice it. I'm trying to keep posts brief because I'm on my phone and those weird spam ads keep getting in the way.

"The briefest moment of pure instinct" brought on by a magical vision that conferred absolute emotional certainty of torment and death is not the same thing as "barely able to restrain himself from stabbing his nephew."

I wanted Luke to die representing what a Jedi is supposed to be, the Yoda of a New Jedi Order, going out in a Last Stand to save Coruscant or somesuch after a long life as the Grandmaster of a flourishing Jedi Order that he, personally, reshaped into greatness and became the beacon for.

I wanted him to go out like Horatius in the Lays of Ancient Rome (and world history).

"Out spoke brave Horatius, captain of the gate.

To every man upon this earth, death cometh soon or late.

And how can a man die better, than by facing fearful odds

For the ashes of his fathers, and the temples of his gods?"

Except Luke knows visions aren't a guarantee of what is to come and no one knows for sure what will actually happen. Always in motion, the future is.

That's probably why the moment passed like a "fleeting shadow, leaving him with shame" and he knew that he had failed Ben.

edited 3rd Apr '18 9:34:15 AM by RBluefish

See this is where I disagree. Luke's entire character arc in the OT revolves around him learning to resist the Dark Side, which he succeeds in. And he uses that same self-control and resists the Dark Side when refuses to kill his nephew (which, again, could have saved the entire galaxy). Luke didn't commit attempted murder, but he's not above temptation. Which is awesome.

Also, what @R Bluefish said.

edited 3rd Apr '18 9:48:26 AM by deuteragonist

Are you kidding? Luke, despite intending to save and show compassion to him, nearly murdered his father in a moment of fear and rage. And that lasted way longer than a split second - unlike with Kyle, he didnt stop at the instinctive reaction - he basically bludgeoned Vader’s arm off before finally stopping.

At least he didn’t need Palpatine saying too much to stop himself the second time.

edited 3rd Apr '18 9:56:20 AM by KnownUnknown

Luke's arc in the film, taken in isolation, is fascinating by itself. My problem is mostly that all of Luke's legacy becomes boiled down to how it impacts the current named characters and his actions in THIS film are most important. It makes the universe feel small when the only thing that matters is how the main cast feels.

I also got annoyed when Rey outlined his story in ROTJ, how he knew there was good in Vader and managed to redeem him. Now THAT is a fan fiction trope, where characters in the story behave as though they've watched the Star Wars movies rather than actually being a part of the Star Wars universe. It was a similar problem in TFA when Rey brings up the Kessel Run. It's always more interesting to have something be Shrouded in Myth and hear names of places and things we've never heard before, rather than name dropping obvious references in previous movies.

They point out repeatedly that Luke has become a legend. The story of him, Darth Vader, and the fall of the Empire is known far and wide, even in the most remote corners of the galaxy. It's small wonder that Rey knows the broad details.

That was in the middle of a fight, and Luke's had decades of time to further become a Jedi master since then. There's a difference between nearly killing someone in a fight to the death and standing over your sleeping nephew. The fact that Luke held back then showed immense self-control, not a lack of it.

edited 3rd Apr '18 10:11:51 AM by Sigilbreaker26

I wouldn’t have minded Luke retired with a happy life and family, but it wouldn’t gel well with the First Order plot. The writers of TFA clarified that he had to be missing for most that film because having him involved from the beginning took too much attention away from the new cast. “I simply retired” isn’t a strong enough reason to be gone for so long.

edited 3rd Apr '18 10:12:36 AM by Tuckerscreator

I mean, I’ve gotten the impression that in the vein of the OT as the story of the Skywalkers saving the galaxy, and the PT being the story of the Skywalkers’ origin, the ST is the story of Skywalkers’ legacy and how they effected the world in their wake.

In that sense, I like the idea of Luke and Leia’s actions being important primarily in the way they impact the current characters action, especially in the idea of the focus character being someone who isn’t one of them but is greatly influenced by their legacy. It’s a great idea.

That seems to have been the intention at least. I don’t think either film sells it well: both Abrams and Johnson set it up then toss it out about halfway through in favor of safer story beats.

edited 3rd Apr '18 10:13:19 AM by KnownUnknown

The thing is, while we can definitely fault Luke in whatever incarnation for throwing in the towel when the galaxy needed him... things shouldn't have fallen apart like they did without him to hold everything together. The main thing Luke did was get the Death Star plans back and blow up the Death Star, and be important for Han and Leia being captured and then freed - massively important, sure, but everything after that is related purely to the Jedi/Sith stuff and his family, not the cause of the rebel alliance against the Empire.

The rebels destroyed the shield generator. The rebels blew up the second Death Star, and they did that without Luke. When he tells Rey "what are you expecting, me to face down the entire first order with just my lightsaber?" he's 100% right. Luke always needed help to do his stuff, and the story of star wars in both the PT and the OT was not "the story of the Jedi and Sith" (though they were important) but the story of the galaxy.

edited 3rd Apr '18 10:19:02 AM by Sigilbreaker26

He boarded the Death Star having had a significant amount of advance time to compose himself and prepare for the confrontation with Vader, steeling his resolve to not kill his father and not fall to the dark side. And he almost fell to the dark side anyway, because temptation and instinct are not things so easily conquered. No matter how much time he spent preparing himself mentally, when the moment came he still had to wrestle with the choice.

Compare and contrast, when he entered his nephew's hut, he was ambushed with the sudden epiphany that "guess what, your nephew is going to become a terrifyingly powerful mass-murdering monster, but you have the chance to stop it all from happening, right here and right now!" And just like on the Death Star, instinct took over and he activated his saber...then a split second later, came back to himself and thought "wait a minute, what the ''fuck'' is wrong with me."

Having loads of time to prepare didn't save him from temptation then, so having an Awful Truth sprung on him suddenly sure didn't either. Yet even then, in the heat of the moment, he made the same choice he did with Vader all those years ago...it's just that the damage was already done.

The dark side isn't some sort of one-and-done dealie where you resist temptation a single time and then are free of it for the rest of your life. It's always with you.

edited 3rd Apr '18 10:21:54 AM by RBluefish

First of all, that was still a massive fight. Luke had been fighting for several minutes, and however much you can compose yourself while captive in a giant space fortress while your allies are fighting for their lives wasn't going to help much.

In addition, Luke's spent over a decade solely devoting his life to a tradition that prides maintaining control of his emotions, I would expect that to not lead to drawing a weapon as soon as something spooks him - not to mention, IIRC, he was there looking into his nephew's mind because he had some suspicions - so him being so totally blown over by those suspicions being confirmed (albiet to a greater degree than he had anticipated) that he drew his weapon with all of those other factors I mention beggars belief.

To be frank, it's not my biggest problem with TLJ, far from it, and if it lead somewhere I would probably feel a lot better about it, but since it amounted to jack shit it just comes across as Luke being written by someone who just doesn't understand or care to understand Star Wars, especially when his previous character traits are being pilfered for the new protagonist.

edited 3rd Apr '18 10:26:15 AM by Sigilbreaker26

I'm saying it would have been interesting if Vader's atonement was not known. That the galaxy thinks Luke killed both him and the Emperor during the events of ROTJ. Like I said, Rey knowing the fine details of a private encounter feels like she watched the Star Wars movies. TLJ itself shows how facts can be distorted when Kylo claims Rey killed Snoke.

And I also find it weak that Rey decides that she can save Ben the same way Luke saved Vader, it's a very strained plot point to begin with and even In-Universe is an indication of being Genre Blind. The movie just tries to do too much at once.

For another point, Luke DIDN'T actually set out to save Vader, he considered himself a liability to the rest of the team and his foremost goal was to distract them, figuring that Vader's internal conflict regarding him might give him an edge.