With The Rise Of Skywalker coming out this past month, I decided to do retrospectives on each of the films. I am going in the order of the story which means we’re continuing on with The Last Jedi. Now, I am well aware of my position as the minority with this film being second only to Return Of The Jedi for me. I love just about every moment of it and even certain things that I didn’t enjoy started to grow on me the more I watched it. The movie came out in 2017 and maybe it just had an interesting effect on me with Luke’s story because I thought his story was a perfect finale for his character. For whatever reason, it resonated with me and I’ve loved it ever since. So let’s get right to it!
So we start off with the resistance attempting to escape their base while Poe buys them time in his X-Wing. I obviously love this opening due to my love of X-Wings. It does always frustrate me to see how badly it goes for the resistance. The Dreadnought Ship is a star destroyer that is, to quote Poe himself, “A Fleet Killer.” The only problem is that Poe’s plan just involves him buying them time to escape while he takes out their surface cannons so the bombers can make their runs. This is all fine and well but evacuation is completed and Leia tells Poe to disengage and get back to the fleet and he turns off his communicator. Poe finishes off the cannons and the bombers and other fighters start their attack runs. A bunch of tie fighters start attacking and the battle just starts going bad. Paige is the last person alive on the last bomber, she manages to let the bombs loose and destroy the dreadnought but unfortunately the blast claimed her life. It’s a tragic moment as she touches her half of the necklace that she shares with her sister before she dies.
Now, it’s annoying that I have to go ahead and offer up this disclaimer but here we are. How can bombs drop in space? Because it’s Star Wars, that’s how. There’s no sound in space but we know all of the sounds of the ships because otherwise it’d be way too quiet of a film. There’s multiple alien races running around and we don’t ask questions about them. We don’t ask why Lightsabers have a stopping point when technically a laser would just keep going. and we don’t know that the bombs don’t have a means of propulsion sending them downward or if a star destroyer(being so big) wouldn’t have it’s own gravitational pull. So anyway…bombs can fall in space in the Star Wars universe and I really don’t understand why that was an issue for some people.
Moving on, Finn wakes up on the ship and the first thing he asks is where’s Rey. Which then moves us to Rey and Luke. Now, if you had any issues with Luke’s storyline then you and I are just going to disagree with who Luke is as a Character. He’s literally my favorite Star Wars character and his failure is probably one of my favorite things about him. I’ll get to that soon so just stay tuned. Anyway, we pick up right where they left off with Rey holding the lightsaber out for Luke and he takes it and then infamously throws it over his shoulder. I really like this scene because it shows us exactly where he’s at mentally. He just wanted to be done so he could die in peace. He goes back to his hut and keeps telling Rey to go away and that’s when Chewbacca breaks down the door. That’s when Luke knows that something is up cause he says “Where’s Han?” I think this moment is very effective but I did feel like he, Han and Leia should’ve had a final moment together somehow. I know it’d be difficult to do in this story but not impossible by any means.
I do like that after he asks about Han, we immediately see Kylo Ren. He walks in on Hux and Snoke talking about how they’ll capture the resistance. Hux is very pleased with himself and he’s just such sycophantic villain that it plays out perfectly against Kylo Ren. He’s honestly the perfect person for the militaristic role. Kylo Ren bows before Snoke and he just begins berating him about how he lost his duel against Rey and was unable to turn her. Kylo stands up just to be blasted with Force Lightning from Snoke who says that he is no vader, he’s just a child in a mask. This prompts Kylo Ren to destroy his mask in the elevator which is why we see his face a lot more in this film.
We switch back to Luke, Rey and Chewbacca and this is when we see that Luke’s truly out of the fight in this one. He mocks Rey for even thinking that he would be and then goes about his day on the island which involves milking some gigantic beached whale creatures that just kinda sit there. When he drinks the green milk is probably one of the funniest moments in the series but it’s because of the face he makes when he does it. Following that is when he goes fishing with this ridiculously large spear and I’ve always been curious how he gets the fish afterward but hey, that’s a very minor complaint. Rey keeps following him until they pass by the tree of the island and she feels a calling to it. This is when Luke asks her who she is and what she really wants and she admits that the force has begun calling out to her and it terrifies her because she doesn’t really know what it is or what she should do. Luke tells her that she needs a teacher but Luke refuses to train her and tells her that it’s time for the Jedi to end.
This is when we switch back to Leia and Poe. She’s livid with Poe and even slaps him before demoting him. She wants him to understand that he can’t be so impulsive all of the time. That he has to learn how to lead if he’s going to lead them all one of these days. They’re interrupted by the first order ships. They managed to track them through lightspeed and Poe tries to scramble what’s left of their fighters but unfortunately, Kylo Ren basically puts a stop to that single-handedly. Leia feels him through the force and this is where both Driver and Fisher kill it in this film. Their emotions are so strong here and also so genuine. He’s about to blow up the bridge but he can’t bring himself to do it. The two tie’s that he’s with do though and they end up killing basically the entirety of the resistance high command. They keep pushing their cruisers forward to just barely outrun the first order and to get just enough distance for the tie fighters to break off. Leia uses the force to bring herself back to the cruiser since she was the furthest away from the blast and only got sucked out because of the air lock. I never understood why people had an issue with this since she’s also the daughter of Anakin and is obviously strong in the force. But hey, people are weird. Anyway, Leia survives which is the important part.
We switch back to seeing Luke on board the Millennium Falcon which is a pretty epic moment for the series. This is where he finds R2-D2 and he basically just starts telling Luke off. Luke says that he’s not going back and there’s nothing that could change his mind. R2 plays Leia’s message for Obi-Wan from A New Hope, which Luke calls a cheap move and it honestly is…but it’s effective cause the next thing he says is that he will teach Rey the ways of the Jedi and why they need to end. The only bad part is that he tells Rey he’s going to teach her three lessons and he only teaches her 2 in the film.(If I remember correctly, the third was cut from the final film.) It’s a small nitpick though.
Here’s where we’re introduced to two of the major new characters in this film. The first is Admiral Holdo, who takes over after Leia. I really like her character and I like how she brings out that the entire galaxy knows the symbol of the Resistance. Her and Leia want people to believe in them and everything they’re doing. When Holdo is done with her speech, Poe comes up and starts questioning her about everything. She shuts him down pretty quickly just like Leia would but naturally the difference is : She’s not Leia. So she has no respect from Poe yet.
The other major character we meet is Rose Tico. Now you probably missed her in The Rise Of Skywalker so I’ll give you a quick reminder. Rose is a resistance technician and her current job is to guard the escape pods and stun deserters. She does that to Finn because she thinks that he’s about to leave…which he was but it was because he was trying to save Rey and make sure she didn’t walk into a trap so he gets a pass. Rose is a very interesting character for a lot of reasons and some that go beyond the story of the film itself. If you’re unaware, people hate Rose for some reason. The actress, Kelly Marie Tran, received so much hate and even death threats that she deleted all of her social media accounts there for a while. I don’t care what your thoughts on any production is, that behavior is not acceptable by any means. That being said, I like Rose as a character anyway. When we first see her, she’s crying and holding her half of the necklace she shared with her sister, Paige. Rose is basically us, she’s a Star Wars fan and it works in a very effective way. It’s why she loves Finn because she believes that he’s a true hero. It’s also why it hurts her so much when she realizes that he’s trying to run away. Rose stuns Finn and begins to take him to the brig until he tells her about the fact that the first order is tracking them through lightspeed which is when she has the idea of how to disable the tracker and save the fleet. They go to Poe and give him the plan and that’s when they decide to do it behind Holdo’s back. Poe believes that she would automatically say no to any plan that isn’t hers. They contact Maz and she tells them of a codebreaker who would be able to help them get on the ship. Finn and Rose manage to head out without Holdo noticing.
Following that, we get the beginnings of the best part of the film. Rey is sitting in her hut and Kylo Ren is on the ship and they both realize that the force is connecting them even across the galaxy. This is when Driver and Ridley really get to shine in this film. They have exceptional chemistry together and even the most avid speakers against this film agree that they do a great job in this. Neither one really understands why they’re being connected but it’s a very contentious moment because Rey has nothing but anger for him right now while Kylo just wants her. Luke comes out of his hut and that’s when the connection ends.
Luke takes her to the top of the island and asks her what she knows about the force. Naturally, she says “it’s a power that the Jedi have that lets them control people and make things float” Luke responds in kind with “Impressive, every word of that sentence was wrong.” He has her sit down and explains that the force is about a balance between all facets of life. He tells her to close her eyes and reach out…which she does…literally. Luke slaps her hand with what looks like a palm from a tree. I had always wondered how he knew he would need that. I’m hoping he had just brought it just in case she did that and then he was giddy about it when she did. It’s a wonderful headcannon. Moving on, Rey begins to reach out with her feelings and she sees the complete balance of the Island. Life, Death, Peace, Violence and at the center of it all : Balance. Luke says that this is the lesson. “To say that the Jedi die, the light dies is vanity.” Which is one of my favorite quotes of the film. You don’t have to be a Jedi to use the force. The force comes from all around us and it can be used by anyone. Rey begins to feel something else inside of her, she begins to journey to a dark place and at first Luke is like “Hey, Dark Side’s a part of that whole balance thing. It’s all gucci.” But then Rey says it’s calling to her and Luke doesn’t think it’s all gucci anymore. He keeps screaming at her to resist it and she finally comes back and that’s when Luke says “You went straight to the Dark and you didn’t even try to fight it.” Rey says that she couldn’t see Luke and she realized that he cut himself off from the force. Luke says that he saw the same powers Rey has in Ben Solo.
That does it for the first part of this article! Thanks so much for Reading and check back tomorrow for part 2!
