Ranking Star Wars....was "Star Wars VIII: The Last Jedi"

[geoffrey]

My grading of the Star Wars films:

Star Wars: A+
Rogue One: A
The Empire Strikes Back: A-
Return of the Jedi: B
The Force Awakens: C
The Last Jedi: C
Revenge of the Sith: D
Attack of the Clones: F
The Phantom Menace: F

[ritt]

The only SW movie I would give an actual "F" to would be the dismal 2008 Clone Wars animated movie... I was working at a movie theater at the time and we played that stinkbomb for the bare minimum contracted two week run to tiny audiences of bored kids who often left the mostly-empty auditorium and just ran around in the lobby. I don't know how it performed nationally or internationally but for us it was an unmitigated flop. It had no soul and felt like typical corporate kiddie fare made by drones who showed up, punched a clock, and gave the minimum effort possible because it wasn't a "Real" movie, just cartoon pap "For the kids". The boring and badly-aging Phantom Menace (A 1999 film strangely somehow more dated than the 1977 original) just barely avoids an F just for the Qui-Gon vs. Darth Maul duel and the boyish Saturday matinee enthusiasm of Neeson and McGregor's performances. Attack of the Clones has Natalie Portman in a tight black leather dress and that Edgar Rice Burroughs-esque climax in the gladiatorial arena fighting all the alien critters. These come too late in the movie to really help that much, but they at least save it from the Rancor pit.

The Star Wars Holiday Special is such a bizarre mutant that it stands outside any traditional A-F grade. It's rock-bottom "Bad" and cynical cocaine-fueled trash on every level yet weirdly fascinating and a neat history lesson (Particularly if you see it with the original ads intact). Plus I've made friends from talking about it and had a great time watching it at parties so in it's perverse way it's actually brought more joy to my life than many good movies.

[geoffrey]

The reason I give Attack of the Clones and The Phantom Menace a grade of "F" is because they commit the cardinal sin of movies: They're boring. I cannot sit through them any more because I sit there feeling bored. For all its problems (which are many), Revenge of the Sith at least doesn't bore me, and thus the "D".

[ritt]

Revenge of the Sith is one of my biggest "Guilty pleasures". The original Star Wars was a knowing homage to old space opera (Among many other things), but RotS is like somebody just grabbed a bad old Lensman rip-off out of a pile of yellowing old ten-cent paperbacks and then spent hundreds of millions of dollars to adapt it totally straight. Plus I have a lot of nostalgic memories from when I was working at the theater and the movie brought in BIG crowds who ate it up. I would honestly give it a B.

[makofan]

I thought this was a piece of crap, for many reasons. I had a 3-page rant typed up, then deleted it. Plus the movie was boring. I would rate it better than Attack of the Clowns, but below Phantom Menace!

[scottenkainen]

Since we're doing grades now...

The Empire Strikes Back: A+
Star Wars: A+
The Force Awakens: A+
Rogue One: A
Return of the Jedi: A-
The Last Jedi: A-
Revenge of the Sith: D+
Attack of the Clones: D+
The Phantom Menace: D-

[Deleted]

With a bit of distance, I can say that I still think my very harsh judgement of the movie was justified. TFA, in comparison, not that bad, and Rogue One, a good movie, at least within the genre.

Now, TLJ, that's the terrible terrible; not because it didn't meet my personal expectations, but because it destroys what might remain of my personal "suspension of disbelief". I mean, even with something as obviously otherworldly as "Star Wars", you always keep a bit of that; and for me personally, it all went away the moment Luke confessed to attempted murder.

[scottenkainen]

We all know there's spoilers in this thread, right?

Jan 24, 2018 7:58:55 GMT -6 @rafael said:

With a bit of distance, I can say that I still think my very harsh judgement of the movie was justified. TFA, in comparison, not that bad, and Rogue One, a good movie, at least within the genre.

Now, TLJ, that's the terrible terrible; not because it didn't meet my personal expectations, but because it destroys what might remain of my personal "suspension of disbelief". I mean, even with something as obviously otherworldly as "Star Wars", you always keep a bit of that; and for me personally, it all went away the moment Luke confessed to attempted murder.

Luke didn't confess to attempted murder; he confessed to contemplating attempted murder for a moment. It was a humanizing touch that made Luke more real for me than he'd ever been before. I love that it happened.

[Falconer]

I haven’t seen it yet, but, I don’t mind spoilers, really. I had a lot of high hopes pinned on this movie, and, I think I am better off having them dashed beforehand.

What I really don’t get is the business sense in Disney’s killing off the franchise’s iconic main character after only using him once. I get the story sense—they consider him the new Alec Guinness and it’s time to make way for the new characters. But, business-wise it’s not what I would have done. Who’s going to buy a toy of Luke Skywalker if he’s pathetic and uncool and also dead? I know edgy directors and sophisticated reviewers love tearing down heroes, but, on a visceral level, it just doesn’t appeal.

[Deleted]

Jan 24, 2018 11:14:05 GMT -6 scottenkainen said:

We all know there's spoilers in this thread, right?

Well, the movie has been out for six weeks, so one would assume so that mentioning spoilers isn't overly impolite, any more, or is it?- Anyway, just in case, happy to edit the thread's title, just in case. FWIW, I also didn't write my last post as a rebuttal of yours; more, like a less bombastic wrap to my earlier posts in this thread.

Jan 24, 2018 11:14:05 GMT -6 scottenkainen said:

Luke didn't confess to attempted murder; he confessed to contemplating attempted murder for a moment. It was a humanizing touch that made Luke more real for me than he'd ever been before. I love that it happened.

Didn't see it at all like this. I think the version of Luke we see in TLJ is not reconcilable with the character from RotJ. - Wrote about it in one of the above posts: So, Luke first goes through all possible ordeals to save his father from "the dark side". Yet, only a few years later, it is presumably an emotionally unbalanced teenager that manages to mentally break Luke? - Just doesn't resonate with me. If the movie gave us more backstory, then, maybe it would have, but as it did, it seemed very out of character to me, and even somewhat random.

Then again, for me, "Return of the Jedi" was probably the movie that made Star Wars a thing. (That's not a matter of taste: I was born in '82, and was first exposed to SW through the post-Jedi merchandise, mainly the "Ewoks" stuff.) - So, to me, Luke was always mainly the character he is in "VI", especially as the post-Endor EU took on proportions that made the story of the OT seem small. Maybe, if the character had been presented to me in a different context, I would have been more accepting of what I consider a fundamental change.

Even so, though, it's probably less the decisions the movie made on the narrative, but the way they are directed on screen: Aside from Luke, much of the plot seemed pretty pointless. I am not saying, middle-part-problematic, I am saying, I wondered what the hell that was.

Anyway, /rant. Maybe I am over-analyzing, but I took it better when Legolas went all Assassin's Creed than I took the changes they made to Luke Skywalker.

[Deleted]

Jan 24, 2018 12:19:13 GMT -6 Falconer said:

I haven’t seen it yet, but, I don’t mind spoilers, really. I had a lot of high hopes pinned on this movie, and, I think I am better off having them dashed beforehand.

What I really don’t get is the business sense in Disney’s killing off the franchise’s iconic main character after only using him once. I get the story sense—they consider him the new Alec Guinness and it’s time to make way for the new characters. But, business-wise it’s not what I would have done. Who’s going to buy a toy of Luke Skywalker if he’s pathetic and uncool and also dead? I know edgy directors and sophisticated reviewers love tearing down heroes, but, on a visceral level, it just doesn’t appeal.

It's a terrible post-2000 trend called "narrative decentralization", in which "medial", or, "conventionally advancing" character-based stories are turned into "lateral" and premise-based stories. The rationale seems to be that you can extend a franchise's longevity with a decentralized and vague plot narrative. As in, you don't want to change the alliance-empire or light-dark premise because of the high degree of recognition value. But what you DO want is to minimize the dependency of those premises on actual characters, like Luke Skywalker or Darth Vader, for the fear of losing audiences when you advance the narrative beyond those characters. Consequently, what most modern franchises are doing these days is to neuter especially content of any characters whose story could in any way supersede the frame narrative/brand: John Carter in ER was one of the earliest victims of this trend, Ragnar Lothbrok in Vikings one of the latest.

Myself, I frown at this, because it makes franchise-based storytelling extremely predictable: So, in EIX, Rey and Kylo will likely kill each other, while the political factions remain more or less the same, and the supporting cast takes on key positions within that frame. ("Poe Dameron becomes chancellor of the New Republic." - "General Hux becomes the head of the First Order.") And then, five years later, we'll get another corporate sequel from hell where the narrative frame remains unchanged ("See, here is the New Republic! See, here is the First Order!"), and the plot is simply set to update the core conflict of within a static environment.

- Meh. Not my cup of tea.

[Falconer]

Yeah, that’s cynical (of them) as hell, if true.

So, as you know, after TFA came out I completely immersed myself in the Zahn/Stackpole/Allston books of the 90s. My wife is into them now, too. Now, I get why Disney wanted to reboot the post-RotJ storyline. They didn’t want Chewie dead; they didn’t want to do the Vong invasion. Still, it’s ludicrous to me that they are leaving the New Republic era largely untouched, yet have provided just enough details to make the Thrawn and X-Wing stories impossible to have occurred. Now there are 30 years of Luke doing nothing, and you can’t even fill it with cool stories if you wanted to.

[Deleted]

Completely agree with you. - The EU suffered tremendously after those three reduced their contributions: That might have been due to a lack of general conceptual direction, but also because the writers that took over after them were clearly not as good. It seemed to me like people at Lucas Arts were literally running out of ideas, and, at some point - big spoiler for the later novel series - basically decided to turn Star Wars into Dune, out of pure creative despair.

Still so, it might have been "cute" if the present writers had at least opted to reference past continuities. Not going out for another page-long rant, but, to give probably the simplest of examples: Just imagine how emotionally impacting it could have been if Poe Dameron had not visited Max von Sydow's "generic old guy" at the beginning of TFA, but Lando. How audiences would have instantly cared. - Or, to name one more recent example from TLJ, if Luke had had a family whose loss the viewer could mourn with him: You could have preserved exactly the same plot structure if it hadn't been Luke who had gone after Kylo, but his wife. Kylo killing her in response would have changed literally nothing about the present, but it would have done so much to improve the viewership's emotional investment.

As to the "new" EU, it appears that the present members of the writers workshop at Lucas Film are indeed trying to use the New Republic era as best they can - as much as the new writing guidelines are letting them: I have not read any of them, myself, but what I've heard is that the basic premise of those books seems to be that the NR is never really a good place to live in. Especially the rather somber portrayal of most older characters post-Endor is drawing a lot of criticism. Specifically, there's apparently a novel about Princess Leia where she is shown a depressed and lonely middle-aged divorcee who is constantly being victimized by a hostile police state. - And as fresh and postmodern as such a concept might seem, "Death of a Salesman" is not where I imagine audiences want to go directly after the Endor Ewok party.

[mrmanowar]

Jan 24, 2018 17:03:31 GMT -6 @rafael said:

Jan 24, 2018 12:19:13 GMT -6 Falconer said:

I haven’t seen it yet, but, I don’t mind spoilers, really. I had a lot of high hopes pinned on this movie, and, I think I am better off having them dashed beforehand.

What I really don’t get is the business sense in Disney’s killing off the franchise’s iconic main character after only using him once. I get the story sense—they consider him the new Alec Guinness and it’s time to make way for the new characters. But, business-wise it’s not what I would have done. Who’s going to buy a toy of Luke Skywalker if he’s pathetic and uncool and also dead? I know edgy directors and sophisticated reviewers love tearing down heroes, but, on a visceral level, it just doesn’t appeal.

It's a terrible post-2000 trend called "narrative decentralization", in which "medial", or, "conventionally advancing" character-based stories are turned into "lateral" and premise-based stories. The rationale seems to be that you can extend a franchise's longevity with a decentralized and vague plot narrative. As in, you don't want to change the alliance-empire or light-dark premise because of the high degree of recognition value. But what you DO want is to minimize the dependency of those premises on actual characters, like Luke Skywalker or Darth Vader, for the fear of losing audiences when you advance the narrative beyond those characters. Consequently, what most modern franchises are doing these days is to neuter especially content of any characters whose story could in any way supersede the frame narrative/brand: John Carter in ER was one of the earliest victims of this trend, Ragnar Lothbrok in Vikings one of the latest.

Myself, I frown at this, because it makes franchise-based storytelling extremely predictable: So, in EIX, Rey and Kylo will likely kill each other, while the political factions remain more or less the same, and the supporting cast takes on key positions within that frame. ("Poe Dameron becomes chancellor of the New Republic." - "General Hux becomes the head of the First Order.") And then, five years later, we'll get another corporate sequel from hell where the narrative frame remains unchanged ("See, here is the New Republic! See, here is the First Order!"), and the plot is simply set to update the core conflict of within a static environment.

- Meh. Not my cup of tea.

Narrative decentralization... somewhat new concept to me, but based on how film treats these things in your example.  I am intrigued.  I want to argue (and keep in mind I keep book narratives out of this, just film) I can't help but wonder if the GoT spin off(s) will have the same theme.  I haven't caught up to all the Vikings episodes yet, but based off of how a metal band called Rebellion treated the Viking history I can definitely see this.  I suppose even loosely one could look at novels like how the Dragonlance major books played out and see the same grand themes.  Interesting insight and concept.  I'll have to peruse further...

[geoffrey]

Jan 24, 2018 23:14:02 GMT -6 Falconer said:

I get why Disney wanted to reboot the post-RotJ storyline. They didn’t want Chewie dead...

No, Disney instead settled for Han and Luke dead.

[Malcadon]

Heads-up folks! (Highlight to read)

[spoilers]
I hear critics from a number of sites/communities not liking Luke being an old curmudgeon and felt that his death was wasted, liking it to "blocking the door for two-minutes", but I see that as people not seeing the big picture. To me, Luke had a highly profound story-arch in TLJ.

Luke in TLJ is burden with grief and regret for a mistake he made in the past; a mistake that drove the galaxy into chaos. Because of it, he became like a Preacher who lost his faith: Faith in himself; faith in people; faith whats good in the world; faith in God The Force. And for it, he left to the most isolated and uncharted rock in the galaxy to die a sad, lonely old Hermit.

Luke's role in the film is vary Far-East in nature. He is like the "reluctant master" trope found in old kung-fu films: Old master refuse to train the young protagonists to defeat the evil antagonist as the antagonist was once the master's student who turned his training on him, but over time, protagonist convinces the master to train him and in the end "the student has become the master, and now I become the student." Likewise, Luke had to unlearn everything he knew to be true and to let go all of the emotional baggage (his gilt) and martial goods (the old books) that was holding him down, and once he found enlightenment, he become one with The Force. In other words: Luke become a Buddha-Jedi! (better than the played-out Christ allegories.. *cough*Anakin*cough* ...and in keeping with the subtle Eastern themes form past SW films)

Luke did faced-off with Kylo Ren much like Obi-Wan with Darth Vader. Luke was not there to defeat Ren (nor was he defeated by him), but it was to worn him of his folly in thinking that he can take over the galaxy. Although he did not quote Obi-Wan, in the end, Luke "become more powerful than you can possibly imagine", by becoming a legend and restoring people faith in the resistance and The Force.

Luke's death was not about martyrdom, nor was it him "over-working" himself with his force powers: It was about him "moving on", as he achieved oneness with The Force.
[spoilers]

[scottenkainen]

Well said, Malcadon. And I really like what you did with the invisible font! I'll try to remember that the next time I'm writing about spoiler material.

[Malcadon]

Jan 31, 2018 10:48:31 GMT -6 scottenkainen said:

Well said, Malcadon. And I really like what you did with the invisible font! I'll try to remember that the next time I'm writing about spoiler material.

Thanks.


If you are going to use that on this site, don't forget what number your post is going to be:

On odd-numbered post, highlight with white (hex code: #ffffff).
Example: WHITE

On even-numbered post, highlight with Flex (hex code: #EEDC82).
Example: Flex

I hope you guys make good use of this impromptu hide-bar.

[Deleted]

Jan 31, 2018 9:21:30 GMT -6 Malcadon said:

Heads-up folks! (Highlight to read)

It notwithstanding that liking this movie (or, really, most things) is not a matter of the superior intellect, but a matter of taste, my problem with your explanation is that you need to give an explanation, at all.

IIRC, in English-speaking countries, there is this "golden rule" for storytelling of any kind, which is "show, don't tell". If you have to explain and rationalize a movie's action on such a fundamental level, isn't that precisely "telling", instead of "showing"?

Not that a certain suspension of disbelief wouldn't be a requirement for a family-friendly sci-fi flick, but literally nothing you just explained actually was in the movie, in-universe. Not that there'd be anything wrong about you assuming that perspective, and maybe the filmmakers will care to give an in-universe explanation of the events in IX - but even so, the same way you're rationalizing things, using the same circumstantial evidence, one could also conclude that the movie script was simply lacking.

My personal impression remains with that the director/writer simply bit off more than he could chew, with this one; the plot and the supposed point he wanted to make might well have worked, but it's his own filmish direction that puts that in jeopardy: Like, to stay with Luke - oh, yeah, I am so coloring out THAT part, folks - there's a profoundly disturbing scene scene where Luke milks the breasts of what probably could be described as an alien sea-cow, and the animal moans lustfully in response, and is implied to orgasm. So, Johnson decided to have THAT scene in the movie, as opposed to, say, the same time of additional plot-related exposition. I don't think it's all too strange to question such a decision.

[Falconer]

Saw it on Tuesday. What a mess.

[sixdemonbag]

For spoiler tags, see here:

odd74.proboards.com/post/153659/thread

SPOILER: Click to show

"Close the blast doors! ... Open the blast doors!!"

[sixdemonbag]

I ended up seeing TLJ the week after opening weekend and thus was already aware of all the controversies going in. In the theater, I was entertained. I wasn't crazy about the jaunt to Canto Bight, though. I think that could have been edited down some.

I'm really going to need a second viewing at home before I can form a real opinion on the film. After the prequels, I'm pretty lenient with all things Star Wars.

[sixdemonbag]

So a quick bumperoo.

I've seen TLJ now a handful of times. Overall I like it. The canto bight stuff still bothers me. It just feels like a different movie. It would be a great Rebels episode.

The rest seems like a good twist on standard SW plots and characters. My overall opinion of the new trilogy is that I think they should have either made Luke, Leia, and Han the main characters, or left them out completely. This hybrid approach isn't totally working for me.

I will still watch anything SW-related and I'm looking forward to the last installment. Rey and Finn, in particular, have great chemistry and they feel the most connected to the OT Star Wars vibe to me.

[Falconer]

Aug 5, 2018 13:31:44 GMT -6 sixdemonbag said:

The rest seems like a good twist on standard SW plots and characters. My overall opinion of the new trilogy is that I think they should have either made Luke, Leia, and Han the main characters, or left them out completely. This hybrid approach isn't totally working for me.

TFA’s Rey-Finn-Han trinity worked for me.

TLJ could have basically kept this dynamic going with Rey-Finn-Luke; that would have worked for me, too. Just don’t give Luke an “arc”—let him be the father figure. It is Rey who needed character development.

Leia cameos in TFA were fine. Fisher’s performance was a little cringeworthy, but dramatically it hit just the right notes. It’s borderline sacrilege to suggest she should have been recast, but, honestly that’s where I land.

[sixdemonbag]

Can't really argue with any of that. Well said.

Another tragedy is that I really felt that Fisher's acting was improving and I thought she was much more natural in TLJ than TFA. There was some of that old Leia spark that I felt was totally absent in TFA. Her death was unfortunate for so many reasons.

[thomden]

It is official. The Ninth Circuit has ruled that The Last Jedi is mediocre and schlocky.



They were being too kind IMHO.


The ruling:
cdn.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/2021/06/01/19-56297.pdf

[thomden]

Dec 29, 2017 16:39:05 GMT -6 geoffrey said:

My grading of the Star Wars films:

Star Wars: A+
Rogue One: A
The Empire Strikes Back: A-
Return of the Jedi: B
The Force Awakens: C
The Last Jedi: C
Revenge of the Sith: D
Attack of the Clones: F
The Phantom Menace: F

Sorry, The Last Jedi is an F-

Other than that I pretty much agree with your ratings. Well, Empire is better than Rogue, but I get what you mean.

[geoffrey]

My current ranking from 10 (best) to 0 (worst):

10: Star Wars
9: The Empire Strikes Back
8: Return of the Jedi
7: Rogue One
6: The Rise of Skywalker
5: The Force Awakens
4: Solo
3: The Last Jedi
2: Revenge of the Sith
1: Attack of the Clones
0: The Phantom Menace

[sixdemonbag]

My ranking from most to least memorable:

SW
TESB
RotJ
TPM
TLJ
TFA
RotS
RO
TRoS
AotC
Solo

[Deleted]