Rey Is A Dead End For Star Wars

[@theartofstorytelling1]

Will a new Star Wars trilogy ever be made? And if so, should it continue as episodes 10-12?

[@JoeArant]

Maybe and no.

[@lostlandmarks8305]

No and no.

[@Niko-hi5my]

Easy. Episode 10: Oh, by the way the empire is back.

[@SeanOKeefe-z7r]

Definitely, but I doubt they'll commit to a story that was largely a rehash in the first place because Disney is already seeing diminishing returns.

[@kamilieris]

They shouldn't had binded themselves on the Skywalker saga to begin with. The old republic or the extended universe had plenty of room to explore. What they need is a good solid new story free from expectations

[@indecay8756]

I know the solution: we need a new death star that can destroy galaxies with one shot

[@takuid]

Genius! /s

[@pixxelwizzard]

Yes!! But make it bigger, much bigger!!

[@elliec2943]

I would prefer a universe destroying weapon

[@Arkham8076]

can it be so big that it's orbited by little death stars?

[@takuid]

@@Arkham8076 LMAO. it IS a moon Obi Wan.

[@Azzameen99AZ]

How is Rey supposed to rebuild a Jedi Order? She can't teach anybody since she never learned anything.

[@stellviahohenheim]

She's going to built the DEI order no white man allowed

[@CanadianBlaze137]

She says git gud

[@Azzameen99AZ]

@@CanadianBlaze137 And when lightsabres come up, she stabs them in the back and says "Welcome to Dark Souls!"

[@ronstuff6330]

All good bro, she already knew everything.

[@weston407]

@@Azzameen99AZ praise the sun!

[@logarhythmic6859]

Bold of you to assume Disney is connecting these dots now

[@carlosaguilar9091]

😂😅…😢

[@jessecarozza8134]

It's not Disney. It's Lucasfilms. All Disney does is distribution and contract renewal.

[@AmericanTybo]

@@jessecarozza8134then why wud they nuke the eu

[@jessecarozza8134]

@@AmericanTybo Because George started to with TCW and because LFL knew they were going to make a Sequel trilogy after the buyout. And unless they thought audiences would enjoy a film adaptation of Jedi Versus Zerg from Wish--excuse me, "The Dark Nest Crisis"--that meant overriding a hefty chunk of the EU.

[@Endlessvoidsutidos]

i find your faith in Disney ......Disturbing

[@tomchris60]

How's this for a storytelling arc. You have a stormtrooper quiting the order because he is inherently decent. Then in the final film runs around shouting "Rey! Rey!"

[@krombopulousmichael3302]

Yeah, what the fuck even happened to Finn, dude? I liked that character a lot at first. They did absolutely nothing worthwhile with him after episode 7, though.

[@ObviouslyEvil]

@@krombopulousmichael3302 He actually almost had a heroic sacrifice in 8, but they screwed that up as well with lunacy.

[@creepertech9872]

I think that was one of the stupidest scenes in the movie. Everyone was “running” away besides Finn, how did the other womans ship get positioned right beside the laser breacher faced at a perfect 90 degree angle to ram Finns ship out of the way? How did he tank being in the actual lasers beam for some time with no side effect? And how the hell was he able to drag her all the way back to the resistance base before the first order for there‽ they were LITERALLY right next to him! Were the entire group of walkers slower then a single human slowly dragging someone else? Why didnt they fire a SINGLE laser off to kill both of them, its not like you can't see them when the rest of the landscape is white salt. Finns sacrifice would have ended his character in a way that showed his progression as a person and making a selfress act. Instead they take the moment away from him, keep him alive, and do NOTHING with him in the movies after that

[@christiansenator]

And he's probably force sensitive

[@laurend9829]

I wonder if having him leaving the order slightly later would’ve made a more interesting change. Like we see his brainwashed side for a bit and then only through confrontation with something that breaks his 4th wall does he snap out of it. I think they turned him too soon. His arc then could be about escaping the order and finding Rey and co. Vs just chasing after her for 3 whole movies. (Except for the strange side quest in TLJ kf course.)

[@SystemBD]

I would not touch this mess of a project with a 10-12 feet pole.

[@damnfk063]

Ha! Nice!

[@Goldnfoxx]

Heh.

[@ronbusby3335]

Exactly! 👏🏾👏🏾👏🏾👏🏾👏🏾

[@Volkbrecht]

Hah! I see what you did there.

[@farid1406]

If I put approximately six hoops on the end of each pole, I think I could get you to take a gander.

[@ethenallen1388]

The two things that, for me, killed any long-term hope for the franchise was: 1 The central villain was a very poor joke. The hero needs an enemy who can push them to their limits and beyond, sometimes speak the truths that the hero doesn't want to hear. 2 When I watched Force Awakens, I saw something that was little more than a remake of A New Hope which somehow managed to omit everything that made the first movie so epic.

[@ender7278]

Kylo Ren quite literally speaks a truth Rey doesn't want to hear...twice.

[@TheJimSkipper]

@@ender7278which turned out not to be true.

[@Bastion83]

​​@@ender7278Kylo Ren was nothing more than a dime store ripoff version of a better character named Jacen Solo. His very concept was the epitome of lazy writing from creatively bankrupt minds.

[@jarred110]

Villains don’t speak truths, they speak lies which they believe are truths

[@ScrambledAndBenedict]

I have a theory, that Ren was meant to be the protagonist at some point but they changed it late in development. If the movie starred Ren as a villain protagonist, it all gels: the protagonist is the heavily flawed, vulnerable, underpowered character with a backstory to be uncovered and a relationship to the original trilogy, the antagonist is an overpowered aggressor for him to try and surmount, and a reimagining of A New Hope as told from the villain's perspective would actually be kind of interesting.

[@RedTigerDragoon]

When I think of Rey: I think of that scene in The Last Jedi when she dives (How does she know how to swim?) into the dark side force energy cave underneath Luke's island to undergo a similar experience to what Luke went through in the Empire Strikes Back. Luke went into the Dagobah cave and faced "His fear". Vader walks out and they fight but he strikes Vader down only to see his own face inside Vader's helmet. It says something about Luke's character (That he fears becoming Vader/He possibly wants the same level of power) and it also foreshadows the reveal at the end of the film. When Rey goes into the cave she sees layered mirrors and then a brief vision of herself as a sith. This means... absolutely nothing. Because the Dark Side has nothing to tempt her with because she has no character. Because what does Rey want? She realistically has no friends or family. People she's only known for 3 days at most don't count. The cave could have shown her being loved by lots of people, a home. Something she'd want enough to embrace the dark side but that doesn't happen

[@protatype7487]

I’ve also always liked the idea that the conflict Luke wants so much is ultimately self-destructive, (he strikes himself down in the cave) which of course at the end of the film it is. His ego is obliterated by entering conflict with Vader.

[@scaper12123]

That's honestly a pretty great summary of Rey's character, or lack thereof.

[@Pomoscorzo]

I'm sorry but you got that wrong. What Luke found in the cave - his weakness - was his anger and hatred against Vader. What Rey found was her loneliness, which is her weakness. The mirror tells her "Stop waiting for parents who will never come back to you."

[@Lucax97]

Like and dislike what you want, but I can't stand this desire to further misread, or just refuse to read, what a film you don't like says. The cave immediately offers her the 'power' to see her parents, to have an answer that will easily justify what her parents did and the pain and isolation she's endured. The dark side welcomes her in with ease, and cruelly spits back the hardest answer - her own reflection.

[@tweda4]

​@@Lucax97 your explanation for this scene is "the dark side is just being a dick lol" and you think thats a better explanation? How is that better? Why would the dark side cave just call Rey in so it can prank her?

[@lordsidious83]

Rey quite literally heard the word "force" and became a master within 2 days. She could even beat luke. It was ridiculous. Personally i just look at Georges work as the real star wars, its better that way

[@Bb13190]

It is not just you. Of the 6 "movies" made by Disney, only Rogues one is worth watching.

[@DAVVEZ396]

Ah, the Dragon Ball Z way to interoperate film.

[@lordsidious83]

@@DAVVEZ396 I don't even know what that means! still its true tho watch it again, it was beyond pathetic

[@DAVVEZ396]

@@lordsidious83 I mean that you are focusing on power levels at face value. If Rey beat Luke in a fight, doesn't that inform you more of the state of his character than hers?

[@lordsidious83]

@DAVVEZ396 not really. It just shows terrible writing.

[@williamsteffey3434]

How Disney handled Star Wars will be studied in film business classes for decades. It’s literally the biggest blunder a Hollywood studio has ever made. The only ways out now are either to remove the sequel trilogy from cannon all together, or do a massive time jump and essentially start over. What they should have done from the outset is just recast the leads from the original’s and start after Return of the Jedi.

[@IncredibleFulk1]

Sadly that will never happen. Film classes actually show off Last Jedi as a "how to do" type film.

[@JBscripts]

​@IncredibleFulk1 Wow. There's gonna be a lot of students failing that class when it comes time to make a real film. Hopefully they'll "grow beyond" it! 😆

[@Zecamilleo]

Those movies would be panned. "How dare you to recast luke?????"

[@seancrowley3142]

@@williamsteffey3434 they didn’t necessarily need to recast, they could have just jumped 20-30 years, the Jedi academy is back under grandmaster Luke, senate is back on Coruscant and the Republic is facing a new threat, either an old student of Luke’s who has fallen to the dark side or Thrawn who is attempting to organize the imperial remnant, or the Yuuzhan Vong or a combination of 2 of the 3. It honestly shouldn’t have been that difficult to come up with a great story. Instead we got TFA🤬🤬

[@michaelsuezo]

I agree with this. They need a timeline splitting plot to diverge from the sequel trilogy. Maybe they got something planned with that ahsoka movie since it happens right after return of the jedi. That show literally introduced galaxy hopping/another dimension. They did introduce time travel in Rebels too, so anything is possible.

[@fundhund62]

The one main mistake was to not continue the story after episode 6. Instead, they went for a "soft reboot" and just redid rebels versus Empire. Which is bad enough in and of itself, but equals an absolute desaster when you are doing another sequel to an ongoing story.

[@dtape]

Yeah really bad decision made for business franchise reasons instead of storytelling reasons

[@Descriptor413]

Sounds to me like they need to do a hard reboot and try again with that sequel trilogy. Although it's probably too late to get any of the original cast to come back for it. But maybe that's alright.

[@natbarmore]

I’d say it was the exact opposite: trying to “continue” or “extend” the story of the Original Trilogy was a huge part of the problem. Obviously, making that continued story a retread compounded the problem. But to make a really great sequel trilogy, I think we need a _new_ story with _new_ characters. Luke’s story had already reached a satisfying conclusion. Ditto Han, Darth Vader, Palpatine, Obi Wan, Yoda, and C3-PO. The only significant character that really left room to continue their story was Leia - but even she didn’t _need_ more story. Yes, in terms of timeline the sequel trilogy needed to be after Return of the Jedi, and I absolutely agree that it should’ve built on the events of the OT, not seemingly undone them in order to retell the same story. But doing that doesn’t mean that it has to focus on the same characters or tell _their_ stories. A retread plot with new characters was a mistake. But a new plot with the old characters likely wouldn’t been a mistake, too. You obviously don’t want to “reset” the characters in order to try to recapture their original appeal. But with a long-established fanbase it is also extremely difficult to evolve the characters in a way that will keep most people happy. Just look at the backlash over how Luke was evolved in TLJ, despite it being very much in line with his portrayal in the OT. No matter what you do, it won’t align with the perceptions of the characters by a big chunk of the fanbase - you might upset a smaller fraction then TLJ did, but you won’t please everyone. And one of TRoS’s _many_ flaws was trying to make it a continuation of Episodes I-VI. Maybe if Episode VII-VIII had also been focused on OT/PT characters, it would’ve worked _slightly_ better, but IMHO the more they tried to tie the ST to the OT and PT, the worse it was. And the more they tried to tell a new story about new characters, the better it was.

[@fundhund62]

@natbarmore First of all, they should worry about the story, not the fanbase. Second, you can't do episode 7 without adressing what happened to the old heros at least in some capacity. Which, to my mind, would have been fine if they had built on what happened in 1-6. Han is a good example of this, and also of the "please the fans!" approach. "People loved the rogue smuggler in episode 4.. so yeah, let's redo that!" Which, in consequence, undoes his entire character arc from the OT. It's the opposite of storytelling, it's second-guessing (a specific part of) the fandom. Terrible, terrible approach.

[@Cinderella121]

Yep that to me was the main problem for me after watching the force awakens back in 2015.

[@MattPurvis-gt3ww]

The way Disney treated the beloved trio of Luke, Han, and Leia just shows how shortsighted and careless they were with the handling of Star Wars. They were in such a rush to kill off the original trilogy characters, and replace them with their own creations; that they doomed all of them - and the franchise as a whole.

[@HivefleetMagoladon]

Tbf, I'm pretty sure Harrison Ford said the only way he'd come back would be if they killed off Han. And Leia was due to Carrie Fischer's unfortunate passing (which... why did they Mary Poppins her instead of have that be her death?)

[@MattPurvis-gt3ww]

@HivefleetMagoladon - True. But it was the way they treated them, AND the way they killed them off that was the problem. No respect.

[@alphatrion4365]

Yes it seems the problem they had was they felt the only way to make their new characters look better was to tear the old ones down. A better idea would've been to write all the characters well.

[@shyviking]

"replace them with their own creations; that they doomed all of them ". Yes. Take Finn; a "stormtrooper with a conscience" - which is such an interesting story hook and gives the writers a lot of room for character development. Instead, he becomes some kind of comic relief/side kick to Rey.

[@GrandArchPriestOfTheAlgorithm]

The problem with Rey is that her character arc was sacrificed for a mystery box. TFA is supposed to be about her letting go of the past and accepting the call, but that can't land because the mystery was built up so much that her past have to be part of any sequel. Meaning that TLJ isn’t episode 8, but episode 7 part 2.

[@thisisfyne]

"Meaning that TLJ isn’t episode 8, but episode 7 part 2" And yet 8 did all it could to undo all the plot points of 7 😬

[@GrandArchPriestOfTheAlgorithm]

@@thisisfyne You know what's ironic, if you replace "8" with "9" and "7" with "8", you'll be correct. Saw your other comment, and I'll take that as the substance of what you're saying: What do you mean TLJ left nowhere to go? Rey lost every obligation to her past, meaning she has to create her own future, Poe was set up as a potential leader and Kylo was became the leader of the order, meaning he’s completely off his leash. The only character that goes in circle is Finn, which leaves him the same place as he was at the end of TFA.

[@thisisfyne]

@@GrandArchPriestOfTheAlgorithm Look, I won't argue about Episode 8 anymore, I've been down that road and it's a waste of time. All I can say is that not much in that movie worked for me: themes, characterization, plot points, etc. What I can say though is that at this point, it's easy to see that every single sequel movie tried to undo what came before. 7 was anti-prequels, 8 was anti-7, and 9 was anti-8. In the case of 8, among tons of issues, what was blatant is the extreme desire to undo the mystery boxes of 7. Rey's lineage? Nothing. Snoke? Gone. Luke Skywalker? Just doing nothing, plus RIP. Finn's critical injury? Zero consequence. It goes on. Rian Johnson did that shamelessly and on purpose, even teasing the fans about it ("Your theories s*ck") Like established in the video here, sequels at their best expand on what we know, but this movie was either always throwing away the mysteries laid out in 7, establishing things that go against the usual themes of SW (for instance: Poe is berated the whole movie for not shuting his mouth and respecting authority, something that is usually on the side of the oppressive Empire. Finn is not allowed to do what heroes do and sacrifice himself to save his friends), and using narrative that either lead nowhere (whole side plot with Finn+Rose+Canto Bight) or lazily made explicit parts of SW that had always been understood in the subtext (again, Finn+Rose+Canto Bight and the whole "military bad"). If Lucasfilm was too delusional to make a plan for 3 movies, they should have at least adhered to the key rule of improv: once something is established, you roll with it.

[@bchristian85]

@@thisisfyne Rian Johnson's definition of "subverting expectations" was basically giving the fans a big middle finger. Despite the flaws I now see, I liked Ep7 when I saw it in the theater, but 8 completely ruined it because of how the mystery boxes were intentionally answered in the most underwhelming way possible, for the sole purpose of trolling the fans.

[@PauLtus_B]

@thisisfyne Whatever you feel is "undoing", can really easily be explained by the fact that TFA isn't actually setting up anything. It's just mysteries for the sake of it. The reason you only feel it during TLJ is because TFA just hands over the responsibility of making sense of it to the next movie. It straight up ends with Rey just reaching out to Luke like "please help me make sense of this."

[@Warmaker01]

Disney lost me as a Star Wars fan after TLJ. So it's just been fun watching the franchise flail around. There's no direction. They literally have been throwing all kinds of poop at the wall to see what sticks. For sure we gave George Lucas flak over some of the oddities of the Prequels but holy jeez, what Disney's been doing? None of us could have foreseen this. There's nowhere to go with Rey. How do you develop a character that never had to learn anything but has all the power and plot armor, killed off the Sith, destroyed the "Galactic Empire we have at home" already, as well as STOLE the Skywalker name? And as bad a character as Rey is, boy oh boy did they do a terrible number on Finn. That character had great potential but Disney willingly wrecked the character and his development.

[@theartofstorytelling1]

Yeah they did Finn dirty. There was so much potential in the idea of a defected storm trooper. There's a million ways you could writer that character, and they totally squandered it.

[@MassimoConnolli]

They had an awesome actor in John Boyega too but pissed his talent up the wall 😢

[@cmdr_liella]

I still can't remember which one is poe and which is finn. I just never got a connection to these characters quite in the same way as characters from the originals or prequels

[@Nick_J_]

I feel bad for the actors in the franchise. They were given nothing.

[@SigFigNewton]

Andor is the best Star Wars content ever made and it’s really not close.

[@What_do_I_Think]

I think, one main mistake was, that they started a trilogy without knowing where the journey goes. Instead they just hired one star director (ep 7), than another (ep 8) with different opinions. And after that, the first star director had to fix (ep 9) the problems the second star director (ep 8) created. Also they hired the master of mystery boxes -- but this "master" knows how to create mystery boxes, but all these boxes never have any real content. Bringing it to the high point with the notorious phrase "Somehow Palpatine returned". This phrase could be used as description for the whole trilogy. The whole rest is CGI.

[@Bluesine_R]

Disney’s corporate greed and lack of imagination + Jar Jar Abrams’ ego and incompetence = The worst trilogy of movies I’ve ever seen. I so wish Lucas had stuck to his guns and directed the sequels, they could’ve been so much more.

[@fgdj2000]

Especially since they had an outline for a sequel trilogy from Lucas himself 😅 Alas, the prequel backlash was still being felt and people were still very vocally bashing him.

[@leospencer2077]

Neil Gaiman create the mistery box to Sandman Comics in 90's, JJ plagiarized the idea.

[@What_do_I_Think]

@@fgdj2000 Lucas even wanted to help, but they simply ignored him.

[@kevinc8955]

@@fgdj2000Because the prequels were trash. Acting like Lucas could save anything when he hasn’t directed a good movie in 20+ years and has writer credits on some of the worst Star Wars and Indiana jones content of all time…get serious. Star Wars is for kids anyway. There’s a crazy amount of great sci-fi content out there now. Maybe grow up and stop with the space wizards and laser swords and expand your horizons.

[@TheManFromWaco]

For all the mistakes of the Sequel Trilogy, the one I truly can't understand is the fact that Disney didn't even have an outline in place to ensure directors knew where their individual movies had to go and stuck to the large-scale story beats. That's not a question of "ideology" or "the message" or whatever else, that's a question of basic competence.

[@dryames4319]

That's the scariest part imo

[@SigFigNewton]

Ignore the movies, just watch Andor.

[@patnor7354]

Hey, it's not like they had half a billion $ riding on these movies...

[@stiqula]

As a writer, I wouldn't touch it. Like you said, it's unsalvageable, and any writer worth their salt knows that. Attempting to "extend" the story is doomed to failure and tantamount to career suicide the likes of the Game of Thrones writers.

[@Odd_pictures]

This would be too risky. But what about an idea of doing special editions of 7, 8 and 9 on an anniversary. Shooting extra scenes and including deleted scenes. Maybe put a hint to palpatine in 7 or 8 to create an arc for rey. Similar to all the damage repairing they did with Anakins arc in the clone wars.

[@jv-lk7bc]

?? *much* worse than GOT writers. GOT writers just wrote something unpopular, not incompetent.

[@musictomyshears]

​@@jv-lk7bc did you watch season 8?

[@snappitydap]

You assume they’ll be *human* writers and not AI bots.

[@coldjay6421]

I’d write her as trying to start a new Jedi order, but having increasingly dark visions, hearing Palpatine’s voice, etc. Meanwhile Finn is helping with the order and in secret is gradually discovering his force connection. As Rey becomes darker (she did kill the emperor as he wanted), Finn starts to notice. At the climax of the movie, she confronts him growing jealous of his connection with the students and growing power. Finn asks what’s happened to her, which escalates into a fight. Then general grievous appears and beheads them both.

[@vintagetrikesandquads4012]

What they did to Luke's character was criminal--they turned him into a wimp. He should have played a much larger role in her development. Maybe make her cocky at first, but then he shows her she has a lot to learn. As they wrote it, he's just there to marvel at her raw talent.

[@crazyralph6386]

Kennedy would NEVER allow a woman to be bested by a male, regardless if it ruins the OT characters. Hell, even pre machine Anakin couldn’t beat Asoka in that dream sequence, which is laughable.

[@starbreeze7249]

@@crazyralph6386 Probably because Anakin wasn't really trying to "beat" her, he was trying to teach her. Rey didn't exactly win every fight she fought, so none of what you're saying makes much sense. It makes just as much sense for me to say that you're projecting

[@zachanikwano]

People love “oh I have a lost youth and need to parent them now” tropes. Last of Us, TWD games, Mando and Grogu, Treasure Planet, etc.. Healthy mentor/mentee relationships are amazing, and would have been a great direction for the OG trio. Passing the torch in a positive way. People would have eaten that up Luke/Leia/Han weren’t super bitter and broken, metaphorically adopted Rey/Finn/Poe respectively, and had to mentor them.

[@seancrowley3142]

One of the major issues with Rey( and there are many!) is power scaling. Rey literally beat a Sith the first time she picked up a lightsaber. This is something that is impossible in universe. Anakin, who has the highest M count possible, was smoked by Dooku and that was after 10 years of training. The creator of TFA didn’t understand the basic rules of the Star Wars universe. Therefore, she’s not a real character and someone I can never support. The sequels are nothing more than fan fiction.

[@chrisrobinson196]

There's a pretty long list of basic rules they broke in 7-9, though they also ditched them for plot convenience in Rogue One, Solo, and the TV series. They don't seem able to recognize constraints are story-telling opportunities.

[@seancrowley3142]

@ I agree with you regarding the LONG list of broken rules for 7-9. I’m curious as to what rules you think were broken in Rouge One?

[@edsr164]

She is too over powered

[@gunkulator1]

@@edsr164 Agreed. The problem with invincible flawless characters is that there's no way to write an interesting story about them. Even the character of Superman needs a General Zod or at least kryptonite to give the protagonist something difficult to overcome.

[@jv-lk7bc]

@@gunkulator1 agreed. w/o kryptonite we would never have heard of Superman.

[@SuperPal-tr3go]

The issue with Rey is that she's literally defined by her mystery box backstory instead of who she is and what she believes. The Sequels waste so much time with its mystery box shit it just forgot to give her beliefs or opinions beyond "space Nazis are bad because they blow up things."

[@gunkulator1]

I dunno. I prefer mystery boxes to heavy handed child-slave-casino-planet stories that go nowhere.

[@Drm3221]

@@gunkulator1oh wow I forgot the casino planet thing even happened. Such a dull movie

[@IceFireofVoid]

Imagine how good it could have been if they actually developed her as a character but she isn't aware of her own achievements because she is tunnel-visioned on her mysterious past, then she finds out her parents are ACTUALLY nobodies (her being related to Palpatine is so stupid I refuse anything involving him coming back) and she now has to confront that her heritage simply did not matter and she had already become her own person.

[@Beastmd]

That is actually the perfect way to describe her

[@wandererofclouds]

Darth Jar-Jar would explain everything in Star Wars since the prequels to the sequels.

[@daniels7907]

Rey is more of a plot device than a character. Daisy really wasn't given much to work with in those scripts. They gave her Jedi Master level powers right up front because they didn't want to be bothered with any kind of character development.

[@somethingsomethingsomethingdar]

I guarantee the reason the industries most talented writers are walking away is because their ideas for righting the ship are getting shot down by those same shortsighted executives. Some writers have no desire to ruin their reputations as good writers.

[@kevinc8955]

Actually I’m guessing they are walking away because the Star Wars fanbase is a toxic mixture of the perpetually online and toy-collecting failure-to-launch men who are way too invested in a kids IP. Nobody wants their show reviewbombed by people who haven’t even watched it yet. Star Wars is radioactive for actors and writers alike.

[@balanc-joy9187]

I salute them for having integrity.

[@FeebleAntelope]

Wait, they want to tell the story of REY'S efforts to rebuild the Jedi Order? The story that Star Wars fans waited 30+ years for them to tell about LUKE?! I can't even- Okay, I think instead, they should deconstruct the Sequel Trilogy the way they did the Original Trilogy. 1.) Jump ahead 20 years. Oh noes, the First Order is back..... somehow. 2.) Everyone's looking for Rey. 3.) They find out Holdo is the leader of the 2nd First Order and one of her own minions shivs her in the back as the heroes blow up another planet ending threat. 4.) They find Rey on a faraway planet..... 5.) And she doesn't care about Jedis anymore. 6.) She is an alcoholic bum drinking fermented purple milk from a giraffe bantha. 7.) Off-screen, she went batsh+t crazy and killed off all the Jedi she trained. 8.) She stays alive long enough to project herself across the galaxy to mumble something at a projection of Yoda, who tells her she's no Skywalker. Then she dies while milking her giraffe bantha. 9.) Then at the end, Poe goes to the World Between Worlds and sacrifices himself to reset time to just after Episode 6 ended. It's at least as awesome as what they came up with.

[@FeebleAntelope]

Also, it goes without saying that I won't come back to any Star Wars trilogy that's built on the Sequel Trilogy. I would consider Andor Season 2 and that's about it at this point, unless someone ever takes the ballsy step of resetting the timeline with the World Between Worlds. But I don't see that happening any time soon, so I'm happy to view other things.

[@takuid]

@@FeebleAntelope Never watched TLJ and Rise of Palpatine and proud of it..

[@FeebleAntelope]

@@takuid I'm proud of you, too. Don't ever waver in that. You'll be happier. EDIT: I managed to cut Game of Thrones off early while my friends went insane during Season 8. Also cut Wheel of Time off after Season 1, Episode 1. It is so good to spare oneself this garbage if possible.

[@OgamiItto70]

You're a genius. Maybe just a comedic genius, but a genius nonetheless.

[@nottiification]

The moral of the story is that penises are bad.

[@QuantumHistorian]

Seeking profits, or even greed, isn't the problem: the original Star Wars trilogy was also completely profit driven [insert that anecdote about the ewoks here]. The issue here is that Disney Star Wars is *marketing* driven. They didn't have a plot overview or drafts of high-level character arcs, because those things aren't directly marketable. They don't want to get rid of Rey, because she's too valuable for marketing (or so they believe). Mandalorian S3 sucked because it spent half it's time advertising other shows, and similarly for Ashoka. Making huge plot changes just so it's against every fan theory is the show responding to its own marketing. There's nothing wrong with marketing; you need it for the studios to make enough money for them to recover the huge 100 millions+ investment they make in producing these things. But rather than making something genuinely good and then working out how to market it, they've been doing it backwards by making a show that fits their preconceived notions of how they'll market it. Ironically they've made something so bad it's poisoned the well of fans who would otherwise be their target audience. To twist Ford's words, _"Disney made a faster horse, when its audience wanted a car"._

[@theartofstorytelling1]

Interesting distinction, and I agree. You can really feel the long arm of Disney's marketing team infusing everything about their new Star Wars content. Even their most popular character Grogu is a merchandising campaign.

[@drewlovelyhell4892]

I reject your assertion that the original trilogy was "completely profit driven". Lucas put millions of his own money into The Empire Strikes Back because he was passionate about his creation and didn't want it compromised by studio interference. And he certainly didn't make A New Hope thinking it would make him wealthy. Even 20th Century Fox didn't have much faith in it.

[@cesarbernardi1646]

@@drewlovelyhell4892 while Lucas took a big risk financing the movies, he also set up contracts that would grant him near exclusive rights to merchandise sold - which is why he's richer than any other movie director. He had a good story to tell, but he recognized the potential profits too.

[@Blanktester685]

if profit was the only motive there would have been far more product placement then just ewoks.

[@JoeArant]

This is one of the better assessments of the new trilogy. Love your channel.

[@RecklessLife76]

Why don't they just dismiss episodes 7, 8, and 9 and start over. It has been done by other franchises to much success. Own your mistakes and write a quality story.

[@chrisrobinson196]

They sort of had that in the better parts of the expanded universe, but they've already ditched that and waited too long to do what would have been the best sequel trilogy to wrap up the nine movies, Heir to the Empire (except they also retconned the Clone Wars, so there'd need to be work done).

[@jeremyfields9009]

@@chrisrobinson196Tim Zahn said the Thrawn trilogy doesn’t work as a sequel to the Star Wars trilogy. Idk why y’all keep bringing it up. Lol

[@chrisrobinson196]

@@jeremyfields9009 It did until 1997. Also, it's better than 1-3, 7-9, Solo, and 75% of the series.

[@jeremyfields9009]

@@chrisrobinson196 Tim wasn’t talking about the lore. He said Luke, Han, and Leia character arcs were all completed in the Star Wars trilogy. Thrawn trilogy is basically an epilogue. Tim said a proper sequel should focus on the next generation while the OGs serve as supporting characters.

[@chrisrobinson196]

@@jeremyfields9009 That's been Star Wars' problem, they're trying to do a 9 part movie series, rather than good individual movies or trilogies. Riding the original cast off in the sunset with the Thrawn trilogy (which was better than anything other than Rogue One in the EU or what's come since) - with a pregnant Leia and Luke hooking up with Mara Jade - would have set them up for the next generation far better than the mess they have now. They passed on good stories for drivel.

[@HumbleRobot]

Star Wars 7 started too late in the timeline for the story they wanted to tell. Vader's change of heart and sacrifice to kill the emperor and therefore the real force behind the Empire (this is a fantasy good vs evil story not a realistic collapse of an enormous empire story)? Doesn't matter, there's a New Empire that's even more nazi coded than before! Luke goes about training new jedi? Nope they are all dead except for his nephew who is a sith now. Luke's journey to become a true jedi? Nope, he's a bitter old man who gave up and fucked off into the void of space. And all of this happened without us being able to see it. Established franchises NEED to have a timeline that the audience can look at and be like "Huh, yeah I guess I can see that." Obviously a lot of time passed so plenty of stuff did happen between episode 6 and 7. But changing character defining traits is something that needs to happen on screen. /start of rant And none of this multimedia bullhockey. I didn't and don't play fortnite so seeing The Rise of Skywalker opening credits was super confusing. I mean it's a terrible story beat overall, but how did they think it was important enough to be a part of the story but not important enough to be in the movie?! /end of rant I'm not saying character shifts like these are NECESSARILY bad. But when they happen offscreen it's much harder to sell to an audience. Look at how poorly recieved Game of Thrones seasons 7-8 were. Character shifts that could have maybe been set up believably given enough screen time had the brothers not wanted that Disney money ASAP. Maybe if they finished the series out properly they could set up Dany's fall into madness in a believable manner and had time to consider that almost everyone had a story better than Bran. As an aside, why on earth does J.J. "Mystery Box" Abrams keep getting work? The man can't tell a complete story to save his life. It's like he starts knitting a scarf, but as soon as that starts to take a recognizable shape he switches to making it something else just to keep the audience on their toes. Pretty soon it's like someone turned winter elmo inside out then threw him in the dryer for several days. His high profile writing credits before 2015 were for Fringe and Lost, two series that have (mostly) excellent acting but plots that are messy AF. I mean he seems like a nice man but I wouldn't trust him to write a birthday card. Okay so maybe this whole thing is kinda ranty. But this is the internet, isn't screaming into the void supposed to be it's biggest selling point? That and writing data for AI to scrape now I suppose. If it matters, I do not consent for this to be scraped by AI. Unless by using this platform I have unwittingly agreed to that exact thing. In which case...I dunno, that sucks and I wanna go back to the 90s when the internet was just naked people and dancing hamsters.

[@EH23831]

🙌🏻 lol

[@Pintoman101]

Well said

[@laurenanderson61]

Well, I love this

[@gafakyusef6201]

JJ the franchise killer

[@Sorain1]

The only use for Abrams is to have him write his mystery boxes, and then let him move on while someone else fills the gaping holes in the story in an audience pleasing manner. (Or in other words, take a bit to see the general theories going around the net, pick a popular one and use a variation on that for maximum market appeal.) He's a creative that requires someone to fill the gaps, but if you can do that he can indeed deliver what your hiring him for.

[@SilverSoul255]

I can never forgive them for not having a plan in place in advance

[@natbarmore]

2:03 The problem IMHO with Anikan’s character arc in the Prequels is that _we don’t see it._ Almost all of the actual arc, both establishing his character and relationships, and then changing his character, happens off-screen, between scenes or, worse, between movies. We mostly don’t see the parts that would make us care about him and what happens to him. We mostly don’t see the changes grow in him-we just see the end results, with sudden jumps instead of on-screen character development.

[@TheBigSimpleBean]

And what we do see is of an obnoxious child and then an insufferable young adult. At the end of Return of the Jedi, Anakin's force ghost is played by a 78 year old Sebastian Shaw; he's even older than Obi-Wan! Now, some dialogue says Obi-Wan "instructed him in the force" and Vader calls him his old Master, but he gives the impression it was one adult Jedi instructing another adult veteran pilot in the Force. Basically, the original films suggest more of a peer relationship built on mutual respect and friendship. The prequels give us an immensely convoluted story of the apprentice of another guy we'd never heard of previously using the force to partially rig a bet involving a podrace to win a bet to obtain a child from a desert slaver because his mentor can sense the boy is force sensitive... But the mentor gets cut in half, so Obi-Wan must basically raise this nine year old instead. Like, this substantially alters the kind of relationship they should have. Obi-Wan, in essence, becomes Anakin's surrogate *father.* Granted, it's a weirdo temple with other child soldiers and other Jedi, but Obi-Wan has basically stepped into a paternal role. Whether as admiring colleagues, great friends, or as a quasi father-son duo, we instead get stilted, aloof, uncomfortable dynamics between the two punctuated by periodic banter and eventually murder. Their adventures are all largely implied and they have no on-screen chemistry.

[@cbrewitt]

I saw The Phantom Menace in a theatre. I rented Attack of the Clones on DVD. After being again unmoved, I watched the deleted scenes and realized they’d cut out the plot for action. The deleted scenes weren’t great, but they had all of Anikin’s character development. The scenes that moved the story were cut and only the interstitials were left. I’ve seen the reconstructed original edit of A New Hope and the various new editions and I don’t think George Lucas understands why it’s a great movie.

[@SigFigNewton]

It was an enormously difficult task. Breaking Bad is unparalleled in this respect. Transformation into villain is tough to write.

[@Blanktester685]

@@TheBigSimpleBean thought you were describing Luke in the first half lmao

[@CorvoThan]

Should have made finn the protagonist. Him refusing to follow orders to running away and deciding to stand with the rebellion was a nice start

[@luralord9202]

We have Jaina Solo, who’s a way better character than Rey is.

[@rosapower7880]

I agree. I felt sad that we didn’t get Star Wars Legends storyline for the movie sequels. The storyline of the movies and characters we got of Star Wars created by Disney was garbage.

[@JamesRDavenport]

Daisy would have been just fine as as Jania Solo. Instead we have Darth Kathleen's stand in Mary Sue. Oh well.

[@Chemical_Argentum]

The biggest problem with Rey is that she’s female. Switch gender and it would take care of everything. Starkiller from TFU single handedly takes down Vader and Sidious and people love him (I never understood y). Jaina would be hated as well! We need male heroes, that’s a fact

[@ericnierstedt6242]

That lack of planning you mentioned is the exact reason this franchise died. Instead of having one coherence story, they just let two different directors with two different styles make three movies. And those movies can be best described as an imitation of the past, breaking the past, and then desperately trying to glue the past back together. there was no plan for this trilogy, and it’s even more insulting, when you realize that Lucas apparently left them notes for a third trilogy, and they just threw them in the trash

[@thisguy4505]

We had 3 movies to learn who Rey was.. all we learned is that she doesn't like guys to grab her hand in an emergency.. 🤷🏻

[@LachlanVines]

The story really was complete at the end of ROTJ, and the sequel trilogy never seemed even interested in overcoming that problem.

[@oliverford5367]

The default should be to NOT make sequels. Empire and Jedi successfully added to the original. But that's rare. Only a few movie sequels have done something new and good. Fundamentally there was no need for an "I can't believe he's not the Emperor" character

[@d3thkn1ghtmcgee74]

People had done competent sequels in novels that expanded the universe and the dangers of that the characters had to face. Thrawn came back from the unknown regions with his fleet and found the empire collapsed during his assignment to conquer new worlds in the unknown regions. He starts rebuilding the empire by gathering the imperial remnant fleets and their warlords and gathering palpatines secret weapon caches and incidental runs into a dark jedi that sidious had guarding his vault of technology. I will leave the rest of it at that so you can read or listen to the rest of the story for yourself lol

[@d3thkn1ghtmcgee74]

Playlist of heir of the empire kzbin.info/aero/PLCS7HJpm2OUrE26UNd-wxKK2NC_zgixLU&si=r9deSBiR6UVU5P_e

[@fornana]

At one point I was actually intrigued by Ray, in the sense that I wondered and hoped that she would turn and become a Sith. Luke says something about her immediately going to the dark side. That would have been exciting. Buut I also knew there’s no way they’d come up with anything so radical and interesting and sadly I was right. Had potential at one point though. Now they’re screwed.

[@thisisfyne]

One could imagine a really sick trilogy that tackles complex themes in which the good character turns evil while the evil character turns good, but this was impossible here (Rey was too cliché and bland, and in the case of Kylo Ren, once you kill Han Solo, your own dad, on screen, there's no coming back from that as far as the audience is concerned).

[@fornana]

@ that’s what I was hoping for, something more complex and interesting. I had way too much trust in Disney to make something other than bland mass appealing. Always the saddest part of Disney buying Star Wars is what they could have done with it.

[@thisisfyne]

@@fornana Totally agreed. The thing that will define Disney's Lucasfilm is the sheer amount of missed opportunities. There could be countless thesis on their mishandling of Star Wars.

[@ShaneVaughan]

Darth Rey would have been way more interesting 👌

[@emperorbailey]

The fact that you thought her motivation in TFA was to find the identity of her parents says a lot. In that movie, she’s not a baby when her parents leave, she’s a little kid who remembers and misses them. She’s waitng for their return, and the tension lies in whether they’re actually coming back, whether they’ve forgotten her, or whether they’re even alive anymore. There was no need to speculate on their identity, their identity was “Rey’s parents.” The new movies don’t need her to go on a journey. Mentors training new people rarely go on big growth journeys in fiction, but they convey themes or help other characters grow. OT Yoda and Mister Miagi don’t usually overcome their weaknesses and learn about themselves.

[@storytold6205]

Can we acknowledge that making Rey be Palpatine's granddaughter totally ruins the character of the Emperor? The Emperor got laid? He had a family? Puke. He was supposed to be a symbol of absolute evil. Having said that, the only way to redeem the character of Rey is for her to become a Palpatine, embrace the dark side, and become the villain of this next trilogy. We need a new protagonists which finds the light side and opposes her.

[@henningKO]

He probably darth inseminated someone. That can be a power right?

[@theartofstorytelling1]

This is an interesting idea I hadn't considered. It's hard to imagine Disney letting their lead heroin become a villain, but it might just be crazy enough to work.

[@takuid]

@@theartofstorytelling1 literally can't do it because Rey represents who the producers themselves are. Surprise me Disney, I bet you can't.

[@LtPowers]

Palpatine's "son" - Rey's father - was actually a clone, I think. I don't think he was conceived in the usual manner.

[@takuid]

@@LtPowers that is not a clone. that is just a baby conceived "In vitro"/in a lab if he is not literally a clone of Palpatine (I doubt this but hey maybe). Not that any of that matters to me. it is still TRASH.

[@zwidowca1]

1. Mary Sue 2. Butchered story. 3. Tug of war between directors. 4. Insufferable dialogue 5. Lack of any character journey 6. Zero moral depth to the character... Bruh... it's not greed. It is EVERYTHING. Everything went wrong here

[@thetrash6514]

Yep, it's the same for Marvel. It built up over time to Avengers Endgame and hey couldnt think where to go after that

[@percivalprescott]

Hubris, lack of planning, opposing narrative visions, etc... dispatched of the OG Star Wars characters in a really unsatisfying manner and led the newer characters into pretty incoherent destinations narratively. I'm not sure there is a good intelligible way to redeem the Skywalker Saga at this point. I think the best course of action would be to focus on telling a good quality story with good quality characters either in a distant part of the galaxy or in a distant time period where the Skywalker Saga is of little to no consequence.

[@penguintaco9038]

Well said

[@MuffinManProductions3D]

I feel like the 7 minutes was the intro to the video. I would definitely be interested in a full length video on this topic.

[@MassimoConnolli]

Same

[@Szabi139]

I'm really sad, because this is the official lore now. Palpatine returned, and Rey's his granddaughter, Anakin's sacrifice was for nothing, Luke died on an island far from everyone, and the biggest sin, the old main trio never even met each other. From now on this is what happened, the rest of the films and series, and all the materials have to build and rely on this poorly-written, not well-thought mess of a trilogy, just because of two incompetent writers spitting onto each other's face, and a money-greedy studio.

[@LuluDZulu]

Finn should have been the main. He got hosed hard and had the most potential as a nuanced character.

[@theartofstorytelling1]

They did Finn dirtier than anyone. Might make a video about that too.

[@Chicken_of_Bristol]

Hey, I've got an idea for a Rey film. What if the film is about how Rey completely failed at creating a new Jedi Order, how she sensed the dark side in one of her pupils and decided to kill them because of it. The film wouldn't actually show any of this happening to give context or justify her behavior, but only as a flashback, and wouldn't even show her much at all during the film, and when she's on the screen she'd be moody, disillusioned, and bitter with how things have gone. What's that you say? That doesn't sound like the kind of story that anyone who liked Rey would want to watch? That sounds completely out of character with how she was portrayed previously? That it'd be like a slap in the face of fans? Huh, whoda thunk?

[@jjk28141984]

Very well said. However, I do disagree with one thing; I don't believe the franchise/story is unsalvageable. I suspect it's entirely possible that the reason so many writers have left the project is because higher ups at Disney are knee-capping them creatively. I could see them refusing to allow character flaws into Rey's character, or refusing to take the story into a new, risky direction. They are probably telling these writers effectively; "Fix our mistakes but don't do it in a way that admits that any mistakes were made." I think the problem, as you said is arrogance and greed. There's a bunch of people at the top that think they are writers and they refuse to let real writers do their jobs. The best counter-point that you made to my theory is of course the excess of Rise of Skywalker. It's true, it would be extremely difficult to raise the stakes higher in a satisfying way. But again, I refuse to believe its impossible.

[@hulking_presence]

It is unsalvageable. If you take only the main characters (Rey, black guy, spanish pilot) and the main antagonists (snoke, new order) and "salvage" it, you will just get normal star wars, the original trilogy.

[@fewwiggle]

As you say, the story can't go 'bigger' -- perhaps it could go deeper? Perhaps we could get a real, intimate character driven story -- with action elements that turn on character . . . . maybe someone can muse that they are a "leaf on the wind" as they perform heroically . . . .

[@devi1sdoz3n]

@@hulking_presence It could be salvaged, but they would have to do what they don't want to -- make Rey imperfect. You could start the new trilogy by using the fact that she did everything effortlessly against her -- she really was the most natural and powerfull force user of all time, but like all things, it comes at a price. Power corrupts. Without even noticing, every time she uses the force, she slips a bit more to the Dark Side. So she stops using the force and disappears like Luke, only she now has a good reason. And then you put her in the position where she's forced to use it even though she doesn't want to, and have it have *real* and dark consequences every time. Constantly have her choose between only bad outcomes. Turn her into an antihero that brings destruction and relief at the same time, always leaving the question if things would turn out better with or without her. It could work, but she'd most definitely have to be imperfect.

[@IceFireofVoid]

It's unfirtunate because episode 7 has a lot of pieces with good potential but then they ruined it all by having no plan and by making the most insane connections to the original. Imo they shouldn't have had the original characters appear so much, if at all. It should have been entirely on the new cast, rediscovering the lost teachings of the Jedi and correcting where the Jedi had been wrong. Rey should have actually been a nobody. Finn should have also been able to use the force. They should have both been equally important protagonists. Palpatine shouldn't have ever returned. And most importantly, they should have stuck to a single story plan for all 3 films instead of making it up as they went.

[@athens_1psvr31]

Imagine the internet existed during Ep. 4? Speculations would’ve been made and Vader being Luke’s dad could’ve went viral. In reaction Lucas changes the plans to subvert expectations. We lose greatness and one of the biggest twists.

[@PauLtus_B]

I think the biggest problem is that we all know we love that twist but people's understanding to why it works doesn't seem to go further than "isn't it cool that the bad guy is the main character's dad?" So now we're constantly seeing speculation about family relations in Star Wars. Even RotJ has Leia being Luke's sister and it's just, alright, fine, I guess? A movie like TFA invites an audience to go speculate about Rey's parentage without ever setting up any character who being her parent would mean anything to her. “I am your father" works because of "you killed my father". It turns a story from revenge to redemption.

[@gabbleratchet1890]

Meh. I was there for the originals and the “Vader is Luke’s dad” twist was NOT well received. It felt weird and tacked on and we mostly thought it was going to turn out to be Vader messing with Luke, not the truth. We got used to it, but I don’t recall anybody really liking it much.

[@OgamiItto70]

Well, the "internet" wasn't there, but there were fan magazines like _Starlog._ _Cinefantastique_ and _Fangoria._ And in _Starlog,_ after _The Empire Strikes Back_ had been released, I remember one article that speculated on where the story might go. Using mythical and fairy tale archetypes and stereotypes, the author speculated, among other things, that Vader might be really be Luke's father (I mean, it's _right there_ in his name: Vader, German for "father"), that Leia might be Luke's sister (twins separated as babies are fairly common in fairy tales and heroic sagas/adventures since time immemorial), so I personally (and any other readers of that _Starlog_ article) wasn't particularly flummoxed when Leia turns out to be Luke's sister and Vader is revealed to really be their father. It made sense from a mythical, fairy tale, _Hero With a Thousand Faces_ kind of perspective. And that mythical, fairy tale, _Hero With a Thousand Faces_ kind of perspective is exactly why George Lucas _wouldn't_ pull a cheap "subvert their expectations" move. It wouldn't fit the archetype. That would be like James Cameron making a movie where the Titanic is saved from sinking just to "subvert their expectations."

[@davidsavage5630]

Wouldn't that also be reliant on Episodes 1-3 being released first 😂?? Even if the internet existed in 1976-77....nobody would be asking if Darth Vader was Luke's father because nobody had seen those characters before ever..

[@oliverford5367]

​@@PauLtus_BIt works because of the buildup. For 2 movies Luke has idolized his father and hated Vader. His whole motivation is to be like his father and defeat Vader. To then find out they're the same shatters his whole world. JJ and RJ tried to copy the shock reveal without the character work before.

[@look4lec]

Abeloth (Lovecraftian force of space nature) OR Yuuzhan Vong (who have organic ships as part of their arsenal). I just googled it because I couldn't spell it but the rumor is that Yuuzhan Vong actually might be the big bad. I have read probably a hundred Star Wars Legends books and there is a LOT to cover. Marvel can make 2 comics into a single movie, use your legends, there is so much "there, there." Both of those bad guys are 10x as terrifying as the empire or the made up first order (empire part 2)... They screwed up on sequel trilogy but there are incredible amount of novels that I would be salivating to adapt as a screenwriter. Look up Abeloth and tell me that's not just pure horror, I won't spoil her arc in case they adapt it.

[@purplemicrodot58]

Disney need to keep the name Skywalker out of it's mouth.

[@theclanguagedeveloper5309]

If I were Disney, I would basically canonize Star Wars Legend, de-canonize the Disney's original trilogy for 7-9/High Republic and apologize to the fans. Possibly fire Kathleen Kennedy to give a signal to people to know that there is a shake up. But that would never happen unfortunately.

[@hulking_presence]

Yeah they would keep her simply to not "acknowledge defeat"

[@ichigokurosaki7505]

correction fire Kathleen Kennedy and Dave Filoni

[@theclanguagedeveloper5309]

@@ichigokurosaki7505 Ok, I'm curious,, why Dave Filoni? He worked on The Clone War, The Bad Batch, and The Mandalorian. It's under my impression that Kathleen Kennedy meddles with his work too much and sabotaging his every attempt to bring out a good show.

[@ichigokurosaki7505]

@ he’s part of the problem he let the acolyte happen. He keeps shoving in Ashoka into everything. he bulldozes over everyone else’s work and doesn’t play by anyone else’s rules, but his own.

[@oBananaFixe]

How would that even work? Legends itself was wildly more inconsistent in continuity. The Clone Wars was already trampling all over EU continuity for 6 years before the Disney Canon was a thing.

[@rwdouglas04]

The new saga was a train wreck. They introduced some good elements in the force awakens that could’ve been improved on in the following films. The mystery of Rey’s lineage, Finn as a stormtrooper who left the Empire, and what Luke has been doing all this time. Instead, they threw all the storylines into the fire and let them burn like Luke’s old Jedi books.

[@JustinLow]

Thank you, I think the most important part of any film is the story telling above all else. To me, I think Disney made the fatal flaw of trying to mirror The success of the original trilogy by rehashing it right from the start in TFA, plus the Mary Sue that is Rey really brought it down. In my opinion, it’s best if they retconned episodes 7-9 and started again. If the comic book movies can do it why not Star Wars?

[@vittoriacolona]

Rey is a Mary Sue? How can a woman who struggles with insecurity be a Mary Sue?

[@JustinLow]

@@vittoriacolona That depends on whether you think a character needs to be flawless in the classic interpretation of the character. Or that the character has to exhibit some or most of the traits to be labelled a Mary Sue. If it's the latter, then insecurity is the least of this character's issues/traits.

[@gunkulator1]

@@vittoriacolona Rey's insecurities never manifest in any way that are relevant to the story so they may as well not exist.

[@lemjustlem]

7:10 I'll be the first to admit that I am NOT a writer, but I just thought of a way to offer SOME kind of challenge to the status quo, by dipping into the old Star Wars Expanded Universe, bearing in mind that it was de-canonized upon acquisition by Disney. The only threat I could foresee as dangerous enough, and detrimental to the status quo would be the Yuuzhan Vong; the extra-galactic hive mind immune to the effects of the Force, to the point where they do not exist within it.

[@epsilonjay4123]

I think that what the audience wanted with more Star Wars movies was to see Luke at the peak of his character. Luke was left to rebuild the Jedi Order alone (except for maybe a few other Jedi alive), and people wanted to see a movie with Luke leading that New Jedi order, not a movie where Luke mostly does nothing, and the new Jedi that he had trained were already destroyed. I honestly think that the easiest way out of this would be a complete reboot of the new Trilogy starting again with episode 7. Rey could even still be a character in this if they wanted.

[@EH23831]

Great analysis. I remember being confused and let down by Rey and her origin story… you’re right- she had no journey and so was ultimately pointless

[@raphaelcalado4335]

It is utterly baffling that disney plan for the Star wars sequels was to “not have a plan”. Rey is only one aspect that was underdeveloped in the “trilogy”. The end of The Last Jedi had promising possibilities, but they preferred to bring Palpatine back for name reckognition. I’m my opinion the story should have go the way TLJ left, Kylo becoming the ultimate evil and finally a Skywalker becoming more than a lackey and realizing the prophecy. Kylo and Rey relationship becoming a factor, both sharing this link between them, but torn by their opposite ideology. Also how said that Star Wars should be told in trilogies? Let the story organically grow, and give space for the character building. It was obvious the last movie wasn’t to be the “last” chapter of anything, it was obvious that the trilogy didn’t build up anything, and I agree, they didn’t build up Rey, Boyega’s and Clark’s characters because of this. Even Kylo ren arc was butchered too. Ultimately the sequel “trilogy” was just spectacle and no substance..,

[@popesuavecitoxii2379]

Finally, logical and precise commentary on the problem of Rey's character. I agree with all your points and I don't think Disney can make anything worthwhile to "continue" her story. Setting aside the ridiculous overall 'goodies vs baddies' plot that is just a rehash of the OT, Rey had NO REASON to join the resistance. Neither was her character believable. I know a lot of people have problems with her using the force, but that's the LEAST of the issues with her character. Everyone seems to overlook the fact that she's been stuck on a sh-thole planet for most of her life. Who taught her to read? Why does she speak with a core world accent? How is she not mentally ill after spending years in isolation with no friends or family? How is she so clean? Where the hell does she take a bath, lol? Anakin had his mother, friends his age, and locals to interact with. Luke had family and friends. Rey has absolutely nobody! the few humans we see try to assault her and the aliens ignore or despise her. The first 20 minutes or so of TFA are hard to digest, not only because Rey has zero motivations but she's far too mentally stable for someone living in such extreme circumstances.

[@imitationpitaya]

Thank you for bringing this up! What we’re shown of Rey’s pre-adventure life is rough. But there’s no sense of that shaping her actual character.

[@joseparcenary4706]

The only way Star Wars can recover is if Disney sell the franchise. No one trusts them at this point. You can even see it with first reviews of Skeleton Crew, where the show hasn't bait n switched (yet), but reviewers are already predicting/expecting it in the next couple of episodes. It's hard enough to make something good, but there's no future when you can't even trust the makers to at least try to produce something you want to see.

[@Jkend199]

Exactly, there is no way forward, the brand is irreparably damaged... but it's not just Ray. (although she is the main problem) With Lucas the force had limits... Yoda, the greatest Jedi master could use it to lift an X-Wing, An X-Wing is big sure, but Star Destroyers are literally miles long... they are the size of small cities, and Palpatine lifts one with the force... then Ray uses the force to bring Kylo back from the dead... The entire concept of the force is done... there are no limits, it can be used for anything now... There was also a reason that you couldn't Light speed ram stuff, the second you make that a possibility even a small ship like the Falcon can destroy a Super Star Destroyer and the Empire loses its advantage... Lucas knew there had to be limits on what the force could do, on Jedi could do, on what ships could do, if you have no limits on anything there are no longer stakes, or risk, no danger... What does it matter if so and so dies if Ray can just magic him back to life... The Disney movies completely destroyed Star Wars in every way... With things as they are Disney can just invent a new force power to magic its way out of whatever narrative corner they paint themselves into... The entire concept of the force is now meaningless...

[@JBscripts]

Completely agree. Also it's rare to see people call out how much the sequels broke hyperspace (all three of them, in different ways). Kudos to you for that.

[@magnusmarkling]

I love how the presenter looks just like Mark Hamill.

[@henryglennon3864]

I'd really reiterate how much JJ shot his own foot by setting the story forty years after RotJ and handwaving the intervening years after the fall of the Empire. It's like making a sequel to a film set at the end of WWII and making its sequel set in 1987. You'd have no context for anything happening, even though individual people are still around.

[@theartofstorytelling1]

I agree this was a huge mistake a dereliction of a writer's responsibility. You can't just skip over the work of imagining the world your characters live in, and instead just assuming that a big evil empire-ish thing will be enough.

[@haysoos123]

Most enjoyed TFA at the time of release purely for the nostalgia-driven aping of the first trilogy, that was certain. We were shocked that it looked and sounded like Star Wars, and we were happy. But I agree, that 40-years-after decision directly led to the horrible soft-reboot, remixed nature of TFA. Why risk it, when we already have a formula that works, right? But even more baffling is that the one big departure from the original movies is that they removed the arc from the central character, removed her flaws, her struggles, and ultimately her growth.

[@gonesavage]

I agree with you, however wasn’t this the only way they could incorporate the original characters into this new trilogy?

[@gobblox38]

They need to jump a century or two ahead in the timeline and start fresh. Make it where people generally know the events of the earlier trilogies, but they don't know the details. Another thing they could do is go back to an earlier time in the Old Republic and create a fresh story.

[@aspendosia2985]

For me, when the fan speculation about possible explanations for who Rey was were more interesting than the answers given in the sequel trilogy, that was a worrying sign of her being underdeveloped and underwritten. Disney was just in a rush to get its money back as swiftly as possible, no matter what, and in pursuit of that there were a lot of what can only be charitably called questionable decisions taken on what to do with pretty much all of the characters, new and returning. For Rey's story to continue, she needs to become more compelling as a character, not as a plot device. There are plenty of writers out there capable of doing that, but it all depends on what constraints Disney places upon them. Right now, for me the idea of Darth Rey makes for a more interesting future path than anything, packed full of possibilites for her character and for any who would oppose her, but I just can't see Disney letting that happen.

[@SmileydeadJ]

How’s does the most powerful company in the world didn’t understand story telling. Having all the resources

[@Gundam04]

Because they have someone who doesn't know what they're doing running things twisting things into her own version

[@MakerofCities1144]

This is on point. Rey is simply boring. She just woke up one day and she was a Jedi. She didn't work for it, she just won the Force lottery. It's honestly hard to even remember her movies. Those films were things that looked like Star Wars movies, but weren't actually Star Wars stories.

[@Toshiro93]

My recipe for making Star Wars a relevant series again: 1. go back to what inspired Lucas in creating the original trilogy, and by extension the whole Skywalker story. The topos of the myth, the fairy-tale archetypes, the samurai films and westerns, the science fiction of the 50s, the passion for racing; 2. keep in mind what has been done in the 6 films of the saga in terms of general design, both for what concerns the characters and for what concerns places, buildings, ships, etc. A mix of retro-futurism, fantastic-oriental elements and a pinch of German dystopia from the Second World War; 3. definitely aim for a cinematic trilogy (not a TV series, but a trilogy for the cinema) without any connection with the original saga: we are always stuck either in the imperial era, or in that of the clone wars. So, you need to structure a trilogy that talks about the wars between Jedi and Sith in the Old Republic, it follows... 4. write characters with depth and connections that the audience can make their own. The sequel trilogy lacks any trace of humanity, for better or for worse, they all seem like robots or humans with a broom up where the sun don't shine. You can take inspiration from Kotor and the novels that explore Darth Bane, or you can adapt other stories, like Legacy, but setting them within that chronological panorama; 5. aim for a familiar narrative plot, but different: no more Death Stars 3.0, no more super weapons or inept republics, or Jedi orders that are wiped out off screen. Write a long-lasting conflict, with twists and turns and a relationship of mutual defiance and hatred between the Jedi and Sith protagonists. Above all, expand on what Lucas wrote, but remaining faithful to the type of work done by him and the team that supported him.

[@collegeman1988]

Star Wars is the hero’s journey. Disney Star Wars completely abandoned George Lucas’s story treatments for what would have included the hero’s journey in the sequel trilogy, and so Disney destroyed characters we loved from the original trilogy, and wasted any opportunities available for the new characters they created. After what transpired in episodes 7, 8 and 9, no one has a vested interest in the characters, and so developing any more movies people will want to see is impossible.

[@seminolewind158]

Tell me friend, when Finn’s face popped up during the trailer, were you excited, or did you see a horseshit virtue signal?

[@Wordweaver166]

IMHO one big issue with episodes VII-IX was that there was no one person holding the reins and maintaining a coherent vision. What episode VII built, episode VIII tore down again, but rather than accept a new direction, episode IX tried to then act as if episode VIII had not happened (and though the in medias res start has long been a Star Wars trope, it has never been used before to shunt off-screen something as important as the return of Palpatine). Also, I've always been invested more in the Finn-Poe dynamic, as those characters appear so much more likeable and human than Rey does - but, as you say, Rey doesn't start out badly. She is ok in the first half of episode VII, but as soon her hyper-competence kicks in, she loses any potential of the viewer identifying with her. Heck, even Kylo Ren appears more likeable with all his obvious hot buttons, weaknesses and clearly visible screw-ups - he is "evil," yes, but it is also clear there is something off about him, and it would have been interesting to really find out why he thought he *had* to be "evil" (bringing to mind the idea that everybody is the hero of their own story and does not think of themselves as evil, of course). Rey as the plucky scavenger she appeared to be at the beginning who is great at jury-rigging things and always comes up with clever, creative solutions would have been more fun to watch than her just bulldozing everything and everybody with the force from the get-go. As you say, she had no journey, or rather her journey had greased rails.

[@bogdanmihai5338]

There is a way! Rey goes dark side!

[@zamnodorszk7898]

Would be good to see, but that wouldn't sell toys

[@henningKO]

Then the whole problem of her not learning the ways of the force and not paying for those hard lessons goes away. It makes sense she turns: She rushed through her training.

[@javierlopez9789]

She is too much of a mary sue for that

[@bogdanmihai5338]

@@javierlopez9789 What do you mean? Luke had a moment of weakness according to the briliant new movies! They already have a precedent!

[@lissavanhouten6628]

I wished they had cast new young actors to continue on the story of Luke, Leia and Han. The Thrawn Star Wars trilogy written by Timothy Zahn might have been a great option to adapt to film. In this one, from what I remember, Luke began mentoring a young women who had been an assassin or someone working for the Empire or admiral what's his name. Their developing relationship was kind of cool and unique. Han and Leia had twins. Leia is still a leader in the rebel government. I think there were point of view chapters by the amphibian admiral we saw in Return of the Jedi.

[@oliverwarren1074]

I couldnt agree more. My only feedback is that you sort of glossed over why its bad that shes Palpatines daughter. It would have been good to have just a 30 second explanation of why this is not good compared to her being e.g. Luke's daughter which you mention you speculated over.

[@catman8791]

Such a short, sweet and well thought out video. Nice!

[@Alabastrova]

I hated Rey with a passion.

[@ceebee9195]

For me, one of the biggest errors was the destruction of Luke’s Jedi academy. It severely limits the stories that can be set in between the trilogies, it betrays Luke as a character, it robs us of seeing the growth of a nascent group of Force-users and the interesting protagonists who could have been part of it.

[@nonmatt]

Working with what’s been established, I’d go on a villain’s journey for Rey. Her power is essentially limitless and it all came too easily. That’s the blueprint for evil, and the Palpatine scion claiming the Skywalker name makes that idea a tap in. Now you need a band of heroes to assemble and find a way to take her and whatever Evil Jedi Order she constructs.

[@Volkbrecht]

That'd be awfully difficult. Between them Rian Johnson and J.J. Abrams basically destroyed the Star Wars universe. There are no factions left, just a random mystery fleet that destroyed the mysterious ice fleet. I'd go as far as saying that the Rey character is the least problem of the saga. You can always find a way to fit in one character. But at this point you'd have to do a lot of narrative work to describe a galaxy in which a meaningful story could take place.

[@nonmatt]

@ Agreed, and there’s no way I’d take on the above project considering current leadership wouldn’t allow Rey to be pivoted in the first place. But considering we’re already getting a 10 year bounce since TLS there’s room (and space) to create new characters who would oppose Rey.

[@danielschoch4881]

@@nonmatt There is a fanfic from Thor Skywalker called the rise of Finn. There Rey actually becomes .......... well look for yourself.

[@paulhiggins5165]

The core problem is that the people in control of Star Wars have a deep and genuine contempt for the fan base, who they seem to regard as in need of some sort of 're-education' or modification, a task they have set about with disasterous results. They need to decide if they are in the entertainment business or are in the business of social engineering. People do not go to see movies in order to be 'improved' they go to be entertained and while Star Wars does have a core moral position in terms of Good and Evil trying to use it a vehicle to address specific moral deficencies that they feel they have identified in their customers is not only deeply patronising but commercially idiotic.

[@DJ_Force]

Disney treated Star Wars not as a story, but an IP to milk. Rey wasn't written to go on a journey, she was written as wish fulfillment for those angry at women being rescued by men.

[@Bat_Boy]

Rey becomes a bitter recluse on an island, and is left out of the next 2 Star Wars movies. Oscar please!! 😅

[@DevieMelody]

I think there was still a chance of redemption after episode eight if nine wasn’t so dedicated to undo everything episode eight did. I was really OK with Grace lineage being nothing, at that point everything was up for grabs and somehow Star Wars revert back to a known path that doesn’t make a whole lot of sense. I never watched episode nine, I have seen every other commentary on it though.

[@erentheca]

The franchise needed to evolve to keep going, not ape its prior notes, and certainly not in the hollow way it did. If Episodes 4-6 contrasted the Rebels and the Empire, 1-3 explained how the Old Republic became the Empire, then 7-9 should have been the struggle and sacrifices over whether the New Republic would follow the same path as the Old Republic, not due to the scheming of a Sith in the shadows, but due to very real pressures of holding a fractured galaxy together and if the means of doing so really justify the ends. They didn't need a reboot Empire as an outside antagonist. Perhaps the once rag tag Rebel Alliance - now Republic fleet - starts to act in ways the Empire once did, and some dissidents, under the Imperial Remnant banner, take on the noble and scrappy characteristics of the Rebels. Maybe, by Episode 9, we feel very torn by the decisions Leia continues to make, while we start rooting for an underdog who dons dirty stormtrooper armor.

[@theverysinfulcaterpillar5788]

It's entirely correct that - whether it was just hubris or greed or for whatever reason it was - the decision to make the trilogy without any kind of even vague overview for the overall plot did ultimately cause these problems. It may just be that they were trying to imitate Lucas who in spite of the subsequent mythologizing that has been done over his creative process didn't have an overall story planned when making Ep. 4 - 6. They went into the work on both Empire and Jedi without any particular idea as to where the story was going. The big difference is that he was a single creative mind so there was ultimately a coherence to the three films. In the case of Disney's trilogy Abrams did Ep. 7, Johnson Ep. 8, and there was originally going to be a third person for Ep. 9, meaning that there was not that coherence coming from a single creative mind. What's worse, it seems that there was so much unhappiness with what Johnson did with Ep. 8 (yes, some really liked the direction he took, but just as many if not more hated it) that it prompted Abrams to return and to treat Ep. 9 as less of a chance to tell complete the arc of Ep. 7 and 8 and more as an opportunity to *undo* a lot of what had been done in Ep. 8. I actually think Ep. 9 succeeds brilliantly at reframing most of the controversial stuff from Ep. 8 in a way that can make it more palatable to those who hated it while not outright retconning or dismissing Johnson's work or those who liked it - BUT the problem is that it still results in a progression that sort of does a 180 (or at least a hard right) from where Ep. 8 had moved things rather than completing the arc. Then, knowing that there really does need to be some kind of an arc, they tried to sort of wedge something in there that loosely creates an arc all the way from the Phantom Menace, but it's shoehorned in so it doesn't work very well.

[@JBscripts]

Great comment, from the fair-minded view on Lucas' approach to building the story through to your view on Episode 9. TROS isn't a good film, but the hate it receives is overblown. Johnson's choices in TLJ left whoever ended up making the next film in a tricky position, whether that would have been Trevorrow, Abrams, Johnson himself or literally anyone else. Too much was closed off and resolved for the middle of a trilogy, demonstrating a terrible misunderstanding of storytelling on the parts of all involved.

[@OgamiItto70]

"They went into the work on both Empire and Jedi without any particular idea as to where the story was going." Wrong. Lucas has stated that he worked out the whole trilogy arc, but knew he would never get a big studio in the 1970s to commit to financing it, so he cut the middle chapter and most of the third, tacking the end onto the end of the first chapter and pitched that. When _Star Wars_ became a mega-hit he knew _exactly_ what would happen next in the story, from the perspective of plot points and character development.

[@JBscripts]

@OgamiItto70 You're half right. Lucas did indeed split Episode IV out from the (much) larger story he had, but that in itself went through multiple stages of redevelopment before filming began. Significant changes to the story were still happening through the edit, with Vader surviving the Death Star being a very late in the day amendment. This continued through the OT. Luke and Leia being made siblings late in the day is the biggest example, with Lucas originally planning for Luke to find his sister in VII-IX. IMO it's fair to say that Lucas had a broad story he wanted to tell, and a setting in which to tell it, but he was very much working out and revising the details as he went.

[@theverysinfulcaterpillar5788]

@@OgamiItto70 Yes, Lucas has claimed these things - which is why I referred to the "mythologizing" of the development process - but I think it's very difficult to say that these claims have much truth to them. Some of what he's said about the creation of the original struggles to hold up to even surface level consideration. One example most people are familiar with is the suggestion that Lucas always intended Jabba the Hutt to be something like what he wound up being. It's a tough claim to take seriously when considering even the most basic details of the original unedited Jabba scene from a New Hope. If you want to go deeper than this, though, and get a fuller sense of how the original trilogy was actually created, one of the best and most approachable opportunities out there are the video series called "The Hero's Journey" (on ep 4) and "The Shadow's Journey" (on ep 5/6) by SFDebris, easy to find on his channel.

[@BenHeckHacks]

The problem with Rey is that Finn should have been the main character.

[@thisisfyne]

For all the faults of Episode 9 - and god knows they are numerous - I really think it's Episode 8 that left the sequel trilogy's story unsalvageable (which ofc includes Rey's journey). I remember coming out of the theatre and being utterly confused about what I just witnessed. So much seemed wrong. And all I had in mind was: "this felt like an ending of some sort, there's nowhere to go from here." Why Lucasfilm didn't plan the key narrative points for that trilogy right at the start is still baffling to me. Who does that.

[@Pine_Gap_Island]

Another point many overlooked: Timing. There was only 2 years between 7 & 8 and 8 & 9. Also, there was 16 years between VI & I, but only 12 years between III and 7. Now there's supposed to be only 7 or 8 years between 9 & 10? This is in addition to all the in-between movies. Not only was movie creation rushed, but audiences weren't allowed the time to be hungry for more. For reference, Arnold Schwarzenegger insisted on a 7 year time gap between _Terminator_ movies. That's also why he wasn't in _Predator 2_ because he felt there wasn't enough time. (Note: only true Star Wars get roman numerals). Finally, the writers. It's not just that the writers (Abrams and Johnson) were terrible, but the fact there were competing visions and directions... what the hell was Kathleen Kennedy thinking?

[@sandroabate]

Disney thought that they could slap together 3 movies, paste the thinnest star war veneer over them, and fans would eat them up. They were wrong.

[@J31]

Before TFA, I was excited. After TFA, I was depressed. After the next one, I was angry and I wanted them to stop making them. And now, I am excited again, as each new film is a gold mine for humor and making more people realize how evil Woke Disney is

[@SystemBD]

I see you have succumbed to the Dark Side. You no longer seek enjoyment, but to gloat in communal hate... and, quite frankly, yours is probably a more interesting story than what Disney can come up with at this point.

[@J31]

@@SystemBD I didn't choose this path. It chose me

[@PauLtus_B]

What does woke even mean?

[@heyyoumewtwo4801]

@@PauLtus_B Women and people of color existing apparently. Totally unlike Lucas' "based and definitely not woke" allegory for America's imperialistic nature from one point back then and the Viet Cong's persistence against the U.S.'s attacks which was used as the backbone for the Original Trilogy.

[@J31]

@@PauLtus_B I keep posting the definition and YT keeps censoring it, so I guess you'll have to look it up

[@several6589]

I'll never forget the way they insulted the fans who criticized the sequel trilogy when it released, absolutely unforgivable.

[@tedsowards]

"Genuine storytelling is a franchise's most valuable cinematic asset" You nailed it!

[@santiagomenchaca4248]

Solution 1: make the sequels special edition that in this case changes the story so everyone has a appropriate arc and kilo ren does not die at the end and have more survivors lukes students. Solution 2: make rey the villain of the story (maybe is the twist villain that reveal at the end of the first movie or second one or start right away with she fall to the dark side and we don't know why) and the actual protagonist would be some one else to stop her over the course of the trilogy maybe finn finds out and tries to stop and solve why she's in the dark side or kilo ren gets revived in ether a clone body or a robot body(my recommendation) and is heavily implied that it's his fault and tries to solved or maybe one student of luke Skywalker actually survive in crionesis and depending if you want to be a twist or not either trick by rey to destroy a good guys base or just waking up in a bad world(if you wondering in this version is eventually reveal that rey Palpatine is a lied that Palpatine and by extension kylo made to attract rey and if you're can make rey turn to the dark side besides making one of the big reveals that Palpatine is manipulating her directly or indirectly I'm in favor).

[@stevenelson3515]

Finn was the most interesting character in TFA and a LOT could have been done following his story of stormtrooper to, perhaps, Jedi Knight. But they completely blew up Finn’s character in TLJ, making him nothing more than comic relief. Instead, we get Rey the Omnipotent, doing everything perfectly the first time out.

[@feanol22]

You hit the nail on the head and under 10 minutes. Well written analysis..

[@ShaneVaughan]

I always felt there was an interesting moment to explore the origins of the Sith. Episode 8 nearly does something interesting with that cave sequence (I think? It’s been a while). But basically once Palpatine and Vader are dead at the end of 6 there are no Sith left. (Rule of 2, right?) So you set Episode 7 some 20-30 years after the victory. You have peace and stability and all the usual normal problems that come with that. Maybe things look good on the surface but there are cracks underneath. Leia and Han are together publicly but privately their relationship is doomed. Luke has a school of Jedi and on the face of it everything is fine, but he can’t help but feel something is off. Then you get a character like Rey or Kylo or whoever you want - and you explore what makes good people turn bad. Why does the force require there to be Sith at all. How does evil corrupt? Could be an interesting jumping off point - but too late now I guess.

[@d3thkn1ghtmcgee74]

*Darth Krayt enters the chat*

[@00Boogie]

The only thing that might sort of work is Rey as a mentor to the main character who inadvertently teaches them that raw power isn't everything. Which reminds me, I imagine practical limitations played a part, but I got the impression from the older movies that the most powerful aspects of the Force were subtle. So a 180 from the flashy action scenes which dominated the later trilogies.

[@misakikoko4500]

About all they could do now is have another grandchild of Palpatine get possessed by the ghost of Palpatine, and become the next antagonist. Palpatine becomes the next Freddy or Jason.

[@tylermartin7304]

What, there is no character called "Rey", or a sequel trilogy. What are you on about?

[@tricivenola8164]

Thank you for your calm delineation of the fatal flaws in Star Wars as it has come to be. I just found your channel after several years of listening to Critical Drinker on the same subject. I wish the two of you taught Film School to the next generation of writers. I hope they arre watching you now. I mourn for Lucasfilm and for Disney as it was under Katzenberg.

[@NelsonStJames]

I think the problem with the prequels is that Anakin really didn’t have that big of a journey. He started as a bit of a brat who didn’t listen to anyone, and no one was surprised where he ended up, the only question was how was it going to happen. Now if Luke had become a Vader-like character by the end of the first trilogy people would have felt geniune sadness, because Luke was honestly likeable in the first film and he was a good person.

[@theartofstorytelling1]

Totally agree. Prequels lack the genuine tragedy that could have been there if Anakin was more likeable.

[@_Dibbler_]

@@theartofstorytelling1 Well, Lucas did a lot in Clone Wars to show a likable Anakin . If Matt Lanter had played Anakin (or had Anakin been portrayed by Christensen like the Matt Lanter Anakin) then things would have looked different.

[@johnsharnetsky9559]

If Rey turns and becomes the new antagonist by reinstalling the empire in crushing fashion. Now that would make an interesting trilogy. Lucasfilm send that check to John Sharnetsky.

[@MsIvalane]

The problem is Rey isn't a character, she's a prop. The whole sequels cast deserved better, I feel terrible for them and for us the audience.