The first instalment, ‘Force Awakens’, had the wit to work out that wit wasn’t required. We don’t want the story extended into new territory. What we want, at least from Star Wars, is someone to sing the songs of yore again. So it works like a sympathetic cover version. It keeps the same beats but shifts the stresses a little, makes the most of having a new singer.
Then ‘Last Jedi’ was like the overtly unsympathetic cover version. ‘My Boy Lollipop’ done as death metal, that sort of thing. And like an unsympathetic cover version, it establishes its most essential rule from the first note. (A symbolic passing of the baton from one director to the next deliberately scuppered.)
‘Force Awakens’ is like Andy’s room in ‘Toy Story’. The much-loved, well-looked-after toys are taken back out for another play. ‘Last Jedi’ is like shifting to Sid’s room, where the toys have been snapped and broken and stuck back together in wrong combinations.
‘Force Awakens’ comes from a fan director, who just wants there to be more Star Wars. ‘Last Jedi’ is like the franchise was taken over by an irreverent tech bro, who keeps chanting “move fast and break things”. And when you ask him where he’s moving fast to, he looks at you like that’s a stupid question then checks his smartphone.
But if the big weakness of ‘Last Jedi’ was that it just wanted to undo things, the even bigger weakness of ‘Rise of Skywalker’ is that it just wants to re-do all the undone things. In a film series obsessed by lineage, maybe Rey’s parents were nobodies. Da-dum. On the other hand, really they were somebodies. De-der. Maybe it’s not like you think. No wait, turns out it’s like you think after all. Phew, that was close.
More Star Wars turned out to be good, but not necessarily interesting. Anti-Star Wars was interesting, but not necessarily good. (Hence me blogging about one but not the other.) Anti-anti Star Wars turns out to be neither particularly good nor particularly interesting.
True, there’s individual scenes which are strong in themselves. (Mostly when focused on the Rey/Ren connection.) Shown in isolation, they could convince you this was a film working as well as ‘Force Awakens’. Try sticking them together, and it became obvious they’re broken toys some poor kid’s trying to let’s-pretend are still whole.
Was there a way to take the stuff from ‘Last Jedi’ which actually pointed somewhere and cannibalise it for a final part which managed to combine the best of both? Perhaps. If it had been handed to a brand new director, willing to say “kids, maybe you both have a point”.
As it is?
We shall never know.
Coming soon! Back to all that art after the First World War…
Having watched all three sequel-trilogy films in the last few weeks (and Rogue One and Solo), all I can tell you is that I love them all. They have all the same strengths and weaknesses as the original trilogy which, unsurprisingly, I also loved. In fact, your reading of TLJ as a rebuttal of TFA and then of TRoS as a rebuttal of TLJ works perfectly as a reading of the original trilogy, too.
ReplyDeleteWith the original trilogy there's some... some effort to give each film its own character. The latest trilogy is, at least tonally, three unconnected films. Or two films that would be connected but have a firewall between them. (At least so says I.)
DeleteIn fact thinking about it the example I gave in the piece is quite a good one. What would the original trilogy equivalent be of Rey's parents being first one thing then another?
DeleteOne obvious analogue would be Leia being first one thing (Luke's love interest) then another (his sster).
DeleteOr indeed Luke's father being first one thing (a Jedi knight who was murdered by Darth Vader) then another (SPOILER REDACTED).
The Leia kissing Luke then becoming his sister thing, that's just Lucas making it up as he goes along. If they'd kept on that first tack, it wouldn't really change the sort of film that they're in. Everybody's related, everybody's a sooner or a later reiteration of someone else. Making the Star Wars saga suddenly not all about lineage changes the whole tone of the thing, and gives every indication of being done with some glee.
DeleteAnd Vader stays (SPOILER) in the third instalment. It isn't reversed out of again like Rey's parentage.
Now I am thinking about writing a blogpost where I take what others have said about the new trilogy, and paste it verbatim except with the names of corresponding original-trilogy films substituted.
ReplyDelete"The Leia kissing Luke then becoming his sister thing, that's just Lucas making it up as he goes along."
ReplyDeleteWell, yes, exactly. As was Rey's being a Palpatine.
"And Vader stays (SPOILER) in the third instalment. It isn't reversed out of again like Rey's parentage."
Dude, Rey's parentage is not reversed out out. Film 1 tells us nothing about it. Film 2 has Kylo tell Rey that she knows who her parents were, and she guesses no-one. Film three shows that she was wrong.
Rey being a Palpatine is a twist within Star Wars. It keeps to the rule that the major characters come from the same few families. Rey being from a long line of nobodies breaks a fundamental Star Wars rule. I don't think they're similar.
DeleteAnd Last Jedi does tell us that's the case. It's not suggested or mooted. We're told it. The equivalent would be Vader having Luke on when they';e on Cloud City. In fact you could argue the way a film can tell us something then say "had you going", that breaks Star Wars even more than the nobodies business. Even though they did it to restore Star Wars.