Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker

[Ezee E]

You guys believe this Colin Trevorrow script leak? Sounds kinky.

Some of it makes sense. I forget when he was taken out of the job.

[TGM]

Was just wondering recently, seeing how Rian Johnson decided on his film to undo everything that had been set up in the previous film, only to then essentially wrap up the story with part 2 of a planned trilogy and leave the story with virtually nowhere to go to wrap things up proper in part 3, leading to the mess that is the third film by all accounts, how then would Johnson himself have handled the third movie if they decided to give him that job after Trevorrow left? After all, he made this damn mess (he and the studio that inexplicably granted him full creative control), so how would he have tried to scramble together a satisfying trilogy and series conclusion, following everything he did in Episode 8?

[Ezee E]

Was just wondering recently, seeing how Rian Johnson decided on his film to undo everything that had been set up in the previous film, only to then essentially wrap up the story with part 2 of a planned trilogy and leave the story with virtually nowhere to go to wrap things up proper in part 3, leading to the mess that is the third film by all accounts, how then would Johnson himself have handled the third movie if they decided to give him that job after Trevorrow left? After all, he made this damn mess (he and the studio that inexplicably granted him full creative control), so how would he have tried to scramble together a satisfying trilogy and series conclusion, following everything he did in Episode 8?

Great point. Although it was agreed on before Last Jedi was even shooting that Trevorrow was doing IX, right?

[TGM]

Great point. Although it was agreed on before Last Jedi was even shooting that Trevorrow was doing IX, right?

I believe it was, so Johnson went into his film with no expectations to have to be the one who has to try and follow it up. So then, pull the rug on him after the fact, and I’d be curious what we’d wind up with.

[Lazlo]

I don't buy this argument that Johnson left them with nowhere to go. The First Order was still in charge of shit, Kylo Ren was now the Supreme Leader, the heroes were beaten back and needed to regroup and find a way to rally more people to their cause. Lots of stuff is clearly unresolved. Somehow the bad guys have to lose. How's that gonna happen? Figure it out, that's the story.

Trevorrow's draft is supposedly from December 2016, before Carrie Fisher died and a year before TLJ was released. Then another writer was brought on to rewrite that draft and sometime in the summer of 2017 Trevorrow was let go.

I like a lot of things about the story in terms of missions and basic story momentum. Stealing a Star Destroyer to replenish the Resistance's fleet is cool. Covert mission to activate a beacon is cool. Sounds fun for everyone other than Rey and Kylo. They seem much too sidelined into more training and more internal struggles that doesn't feel like it pushes anything forward. Also, Kylo has to be redeemed, he just does. His whole thing is about his struggle against his natural inclination towards the light side. He needs to be the big bad, for sure, but there needs to be something he sets in motion that he regrets and helps the Resistance undo. Carrie Fisher's death made this difficult for sure; their confrontation would have been a major turning point. Maybe it's sacrilege, but they should have re-cast Leia. Bite that bullet and get Cherry Jones on the phone, just for the sake of the story and not being handcuffed to real world events. Kylo killing Rey's parents is probably a bridge too far. Maybe he was there when it happened, but he can't have delivered the blow. Also, the timing is just too off, Kylo isn't that much older than Rey. We're to believe that a 10 year old Kylo killed these people, before he fell from grace at Jedi academy? Please.

I've got more thoughts, and I loved TROS even with all it's faults, but this had some cool first-draft possibilities that could have then been refined. Title's so good, too.

[Grouchy]

Sounds good and like they had an actual movie to make at some point. I also disagree that Johnson left the trilogy with nowhere to go - it's a middle act, it has to leave unsolved problems and enigmas. The real issue, as mentioned before, is that Abrams is an awful writer.

[TGM]

Really, all that was left unresolved was the fact that the group of bad guys still needed to be officially taken out. And, that's about it. Mind you, two movies deep, and we still don't really actually know anything about the First Order or their actual goals or objectives, just that they're bad. So, going into a third movie, that's not exactly the most compelling narrative to keep me wanting to come back.

Compare that to Empire, which left us with Han being captured, Luke learning that Darth Vader is his father, and him failing miserably and learning he's still got a lot of growing left to do if he's going to take on such a powerful force, and yeah, there's a lot to keep us coming back to see how this thing gets resolved.

By the end of Jedi though, Snoke's already been killed, Kylo's the new leader, but just got made to look like a total bitch, so not exactly all that threatening a presence to take Snoke's place, Rey's now suddenly more powerful than ever, and the First Order may still exist, but I've been given no real reason to believe that they're going to be much of a threat to the resistance by this point anyhow. As I watched the trailers for The Rise of Skywalker, I literally found myself asking, what is even the story going into this movie? Just that the First Order still needs to be defeated?

So sure, that much is still yet to be fully resolved, so on a purely technical level, you could say that Johnson left that much open. But he didn't exactly hook up the next director after him with any compelling direction to really take the story, or give anyone any real driving reason to need to see how this ends.

[TGM]

It also doesn't help that he chose to close out his movie with a series closing shot, as opposed to a "part 2 of a trilogy" closing shot. XP

[[ETM]]

Abrams ended turned the ending of the New Thing into the ending of the Old Thing which we already had closure on. Johnson deconstructed (or so he thought) the Old Thing so that by ending the New Thing in Ep. 9 there was an opportunity for doing something fresh to take the franchise into the future. I was fully on board with that.

Sent from my Mi 9 Lite using Tapatalk

[Dukefrukem]

Trevorrow left Episode IX on September 5, 2017... a year and 3 months before Last Jedi released.

[Grouchy]

Really, all that was left unresolved was the fact that the group of bad guys still needed to be officially taken out. And, that's about it. Mind you, two movies deep, and we still don't really actually know anything about the First Order or their actual goals or objectives, just that they're bad. So, going into a third movie, that's not exactly the most compelling narrative to keep me wanting to come back.

Compare that to Empire, which left us with Han being captured, Luke learning that Darth Vader is his father, and him failing miserably and learning he's still got a lot of growing left to do if he's going to take on such a powerful force, and yeah, there's a lot to keep us coming back to see how this thing gets resolved.

By the end of Jedi though, Snoke's already been killed, Kylo's the new leader, but just got made to look like a total bitch, so not exactly all that threatening a presence to take Snoke's place, Rey's now suddenly more powerful than ever, and the First Order may still exist, but I've been given no real reason to believe that they're going to be much of a threat to the resistance by this point anyhow. As I watched the trailers for The Rise of Skywalker, I literally found myself asking, what is even the story going into this movie? Just that the First Order still needs to be defeated?

So sure, that much is still yet to be fully resolved, so on a purely technical level, you could say that Johnson left that much open. But he didn't exactly hook up the next director after him with any compelling direction to really take the story, or give anyone any real driving reason to need to see how this ends.

You know what? I agree. I still think Jedi is good but it doesn't leave us with a very strong cliffhanger. The whole new trilogy needed another villain besides Kylo.

[Ezee E]

You know what? I agree. I still think Jedi is good but it doesn't leave us with a very strong cliffhanger. The whole new trilogy as a whole needed another villain besides Kylo.

There was Snoke, but...

[Skitch]

I will not get dragged into another Last Jedi argument, I really will not.

[Dukefrukem]

[Dukefrukem]

[TGM]

[Dukefrukem]

Was there some kind of announcement about that recently or something?

[TGM]

Was there some kind of announcement about that recently or something?

It was in the officially released novelization of the movie.

[TGM]

And apparently the novelization also confirms that Rey's father was in fact a failed Palpatine clone.

https://screenrant.com/star-wars-ris...campaign=SR-TW

[Ezee E]

And apparently the novelization also confirms that Rey's father was in fact a failed Palpatine clone.

https://screenrant.com/star-wars-ris...campaign=SR-TW

Just goes to show how bad that last movie is.

[Dukefrukem]

That's so fucking stupid.

[Skitch]

I said it before and I'll say it again, theres literally no theory on her lineage I've heard that holds a candle to her just being a nobody.

[transmogrifier]

My feelings about the entire trilogy can be summed up thusly: if you know that you are going to make a trilogy right from the start, perhaps it would pay to (a) sketch out the story for the entire trilogy before doing anything else and (b) hire directors who are interested in that story. This entire thing is an interesting case study in a movie studio just desperate to get stuff out to capitalize on the IP and make money without thinking about anything else.

[Ezee E]

My feelings about the entire trilogy can be summed up thusly: if you know that you are going to make a trilogy right from the start, perhaps it would pay to (a) sketch out the story for the entire trilogy before doing anything else and (b) hire directors who are interested in that story. This entire thing is an interesting case study in a movie studio just desperate to get stuff out to capitalize on the IP and make money without thinking about anything else.

Oops.

[Dukefrukem]

Why does this feel like the better story on film? It allows to give perspective of why Kylo REn was so angry in Force Awakens.