My thoughts on The Last Jedi.....

Just some thoughts......

I am a huge Star Wars fan. A total geek. I have never known a time without Star Wars in my life. I was born in 1980, the same year the best movie from the whole saga was released. I'm talking of course about The Empire Strikes back.

When I was a kid I wanted to be Luke Skywalker. I wanted to swing about a lightsabre and beat the bad guys.  I wanted to fly starfighters and save the galaxy. I was obsessed. And I still am. I've spent a pretty penny on Star Wars "stuff". Posters, pictures, toys, figures, Lego, drones (proper ones).....the list goes on. I think I have a R2D2 in just about every room in my house! So I feel qualified to comment on the latest movie.

I know I'm late to the party here, but The Last Jedi must be the most controversial Star Wars movie since the prequels. It is certainly the most controversial of the Disney released movies. As a side note I think Rogue One is the best of the Disney movies.....

Anyway...The Last Jedi.

I loved the intro of the movie. Where the Resistance bombers, led by Poe, are mounting an attack on the First Orders Dreadnought. The opening 10 minute's are a real rush and I thought it was well done. It really sets the tone of the movie with the, in my opinion mostly misplaced, humour. The interaction between Poe and Hux was weird. The comedy felt forced and I was really distracted by the sight of Eddie Hitler standing on deck! But it was a good intro non the less and set us up to Poe's rebellious side, by going against Leia's orders, which would be pivotal in the story.

We then see the Resistance evacuating from D'Qar. Apparently there was originally meant to be a rememberance ceremony for Han before the evacuation but this was destined for the cutting room floor. It would have been good to see this, Han deserved that, then see the Resistance scrambling to evacuate. Opportunity missed there I think.

My first sharp intake of breath/gasp came when we went back to Ach-To and Rey is holding out the lightsabre to Luke. Luke takes the lightsabre and tosses it over his shoulder! What?! I loudly exclaimed in the cinema. Why would he do that? We then find out Luke wants the Jedi to end because the legacy of the Jedi is failure. And we find out that Luke is in hiding because he almost came to slaughtering his own nephew, Ben Solo. We get a few different takes on this story from Luke and Kylo but non of them really make any sense when we consider what we already know about Luke from the original trilogy. Snoke has seduced Ben and Luke senses it. He briefly considers killing Ben but Ben awakes to stop him, and destroys the Jedi Temple. Luke flees to Ach-To embarrassed and ashamed. But why would Luke do this? This dynamic completely changes everything we thought we knew about Luke. As Mark Hamill said himself Luke wouldn't give up. We saw that he didn't give up with Vader. Why is he giving up now? It was hard to comprehend. And I didn't like that.

The whole interaction between Rey and Luke was of course very reminiscent of Luke and Yoda. Speaking of Yoda I found his appearance and dialogue strange. Luke managed to get two lessons in with Rey before she got rumbled "force talking" to Kylo and Luke kicks off. A bit of a set to ensues and Luke tells Rey this has aren't going to go the way she thinks. Well that was certainly true for the rest of us too!

Meanwhile the First Order attack the resistance. Kylo Ten briefly pauses while pressing the trigger on his Tie Silencer. A connection with his mother perhaps? But it doesn't matter because the Resistance ship bridge gets blown up and here comes my second gasp, but this time with a shake of the head..... Leia floating through space like Mary Poppins. As a concept I think it's very powerful, but it was poorly executed. It could have been a huge moment, showing us Leia's control of the force which we haven't seen before since Luke communicated with her on Bespin. But it wasn't. It was Mary Poppins in space. Shame.

Let me talk about some more things that I did like. The chemistry between Kylo and Rey was excellent. When Rey goes to him and he takes her to Snoke was, again, a nod to Vader taking Luke to Palpatine. But that whole scene with Snoke and the lightsabre battle was as excilerating as it was perplexing. Great battle but what about Snoke?! Is that it for him? Personally I didn't buy into all the theories that were doing the rounds about him online. Fans were whipping themselves up into a frenzy about who he was, his back story, his relationship with with Kylo or Rey.....but that was that. He's dead. Or that's how it stands at the minute...... The battle with the Praetorian Guards was superb. Very exciting and the score at that point was brilliant. Goose bumps stuff.

The best scene, visually, in the whole movie was when Holdo turned the Resistance ship square on with the Star Destroyer, powered up the hyper drive, jumped to light speed and ripped that sucker in half. It was very powerful scene. I loved it. All this happened while Finn, Rose and BB8 were being double crossed by DJ where there was another visually stunning scene with Finn and Phasma duking it out. But I wasn't really digging BB8 riding to the rescue in the AT ST.

I also loved the battle on Crait. Leia standing at the entrance of the base was beautiful. Chewie and Rey riding to the rescue in the Falcon was brilliant. I really liked Luke and Kylos confrontation......until we found out he was using the force to project himself. Although there were clues in his appearance that all was not as it seemed.

I think Luke expiring was essential to where the franchise is going. It's clearly going in a new direction and I'm ok with that. Nothing will ever beat the original trilogy and I don't expect any of these movies to surpass them. So I'm just happy to sit back and enjoy the ride.

I enjoyed the movie enough to go see it 3 times. Overall I thought it was excellent. A special mention for John Williams who once again nailed the score.