What if I told you that there were only 6 movies ever made
The weird thing about the sequels is the weird amount of people coping and saying they’re not that bad. It’s literally bad fanfiction written by people who couldn’t care less about the franchise.
I was a kid when the prequels came out and loved them despite how they were poorly recieved by old fans.
Maybe these people who like the sequels are kids/teens.
I actually really liked Last Jedi on its own and consider it in the top half of my ranking of the franchise. I think Luke’s characterization could’ve been handled better (and the whole Canto Bight subplot could’ve been cut wholesale) but looking at myself at 23 (how old Luke was in RotJ) and my experiences since, I found the lapse of judgement and faded optimism quite relatable. Adam Driver is one of my favorite actors and his portrayal of an abusive yet charismatic antagonist turned love interest was spot-on. There’s also the comparisons you could make between the First Order and the rise of fascism in America today. That one’s a bit of a stretch but it’s important to recognize World War II’s influence on the original trilogy and the Iraq War’s on the prequels.
That said, Rise of Skywalker is not only the worst Star Wars film- I consider it the worst film I’ve ever watched. It’s not a poorly-made film, the cinematography is great, but the plot is nonsensical. It redacts everything they set up in the Last Jedi, retroactively making that one worse than it is standalone. What seals it though is this will always be the ending of the saga- they can’t go back and fix it. I’ve probably seen worse movies, but the disappointment will never reach the level that this one gives me.
Last Jedi was a good movie but it wasn’t a good Star Wars.
Technically it is very good, the director is great and made some brilliant stuff like knives out and tlj certainly isn’t a boring watch.
7th was a mediocre ok movie and ok Star Wars. 9th was neither. Their stories don’t form cohesive whole.
To be honest nowadays I only like 4k77-83. Prequels are just cringe as an adult. At least we can all agree I think that the acolyte was some forgettable misunderstanding. I watched house of the dragon right after acolyte and I couldn’t believe how much much better the dragon show is. 180 milion dollars. I only remember I watched it but not a single scene made me feel anything
I was 20 when TPM released and not a single person I knew liked it. It is still the most disappointing part of the franchise for me with ep2 being a close second. Ep3 was an improvement but still just ok.
Now I see people in their 20s and early 30s that live the prequels and it’s just strange to me. They’re no better than the sequels (and worse in some ways) so I really don’t understand people that enjoy them while crapping all over the newer films.
The prequels had a good story told incredibly poorly while the sequels have a bad story but at least it is told well (or at least better) and neither of those are recipes for a good film.
I liked TPM, except for the scenes with Anakin. I just hated how he was written, and the acting didn’t help. Huuuuuuge crush on Natalie Portman though
I was also 20 when TPM was released. I hated everything about it at first. Then a couple years later when RLM made their review of the trilogy, it gave my thoughts new form, and I had to realize that what the prequels did well was establish a lot of lore and world building, which made TCW possible. Unlike most of the badly written EU books, it dared to deviate from X-Wings & TIEs, Han Solo and even the mysteries of the force. Even if we have forgotten gems like force speed, never to be used again.
And TCW is the bomb.
The prequels had a good story told incredibly poorly
This is redeemable, fun to read about extra info on wookiepedia, and fun to rewatch in whole context of that good story.
while the sequels have a bad story but at least it is told well (or at least better)
This is not redeemable, adds nonsense and contradictions to wookiepedia, and why bother rewatching a bad story at all? But hey, at least the acting is good and special effects are pretty!..?
To be fair, if you look at the original movies, most of the universe info is not contained therein.
There are books. You can, for example, pluck a trilogy on Han Solo’s backstory off the shelf at Barnes & Noble. You could do that 15-20 years ago. The books are all written by an array of different authors though they all take place within the Star Wars universe. What is that if not professionally written fan fiction?
FF isn’t my thing, I’m not endorsing it, just stating what I encountered when I tried to read a book or two engaging the Star Wars universe in the past.
They all had a stamp of approval from George Lucas though. Once Disney bought the franchise they said fuck all that and made it “not cannon”.
I care. New Futurama seems different. I’ve seen all episodes and movies prior to 2023 at least 20 times a piece. At very least. The pre-2023 episodes are definitely all over the place in terms of quality too, don’t get me wrong. I really tried to keep an open mind but the new Hulu stuff seems different.
I mean, it’s not cope, I just like 7 and 8. I’m not a huge Star Wars fan, I’m not out to change anyone’s mind, I just liked the movies as a fun adventure with some good themes. I didn’t like 9 because my favorite part of 7 and 8 was the idea that you don’t have to be from some powerful family to be a hero (something that was better executed in Knives Out), but 9 really threw all that away.
I just wanted a fun star wars movie and every single one felt like it was star wars. Sure the plot sucked but I still enjoyed watching them.
I’m going to be honest, I truly think there’s more value to be able to enjoy things freely in life. People who find delight easily aren’t as foolish as you’d think. When I’m salty, those are the people I find myself envying. I’m the one who feels like an idiot when I notice.
I would rather hang out with someone that allows themselves to feel joy in silly things rather than one who has no patience for mediocrity.
Episode 7: Derivative but fun
Episode 8: Pure trash
Episode 9: Desperately trying to piece together the plot
Episode 7: derivative boredom
Episode 8: I like thi—WHAT THE HECK IS HAPPENING? WHY??
Episode 9: JJ desperately trying to piece together a plot
9 was a reaction to the challenge of actually having to tell a story. The challenge was not accepted.
I’ve always said that the worst thing that 9 did was completely destroy any excitement for Star Wars in an instant.
Prior to 9 releasing, people didn’t like 8 and were already souring on 7, but there was still discourse, people caught up on Star Wars news, people were excited for the new content.
After 9, the excitement dropped like a brick. It was the closure of a trilogy in one of the most profitable IPs in the world. There was still more content planned to come out soon iirc (the shows, and I think there was talk of more movies), so it’s not like people stopped caring due to the lack of content. Nobody I knew was interested in discussing fan theories or analyzing the movies (except to rag on them, I suppose). It was as if millions of voices cried out in terror… And were suddenly silenced.
9 is just generic. It’s mediocre. 8 is an active train wreck. God, I remember sitting in the theatre and being baffled by the opening ‘conversation’ between Hux and Poe. I legit thought it might have been another one of those fan vids that they show in the Alamo Theatre before the actual movie began, despite the opening crawl.
“Somehow”, lightspeed skipping, 3PO not being able to translate from sith, the ancient dagger that is also the shape of the crashed death star from a highly specific angle, Palpatine fucks, whatever a diad is, 10,000 star destroyers.
I’m not pretending that 8 is a masterpiece, it isn’t, and it’s worse than any of the OT, but at least Johnson tried to do something to keep star wars at a galactic scale.
The worst bit of 9 is how small it makes star wars. Everything comes down to a tale of two families - Palpatine and Skywalker - in a way that nullifies everyone else’s involvement. For a story that spans a literal galaxy, having it come down to those two families, twice, is terrible writing.
I see it the other way, 8 was an alright movie if it was standalone and not part of SW. The things most people disliked are fine if it was some generic sci-fi action movie. “Jake Skywalker” is a nonissue if you don’t think he’s supposed to be Luke, the quippy lines were common, the weird bits like the Mary Poppins scene or the Holdo maneuver are acceptable in some other sci-fi movie. Wouldn’t have been a masterpiece, but it’s still relatively put together.
9 struggled to be a film. Remove it from SW and it’s almost worse— 8 could feasibly be greenlit and released by lazy execs, but 9 would’ve been cancelled in production. Pacing was jarring to the point of feeling unfinished, plot was one of the least coherent in a mega blockbuster, and story conveniences were nauseatingly poor even if it wasn’t Star Wars. It feels like they just put something together real quick without the editors and it got leaked. None of it was serviceable. And god, not to repeat myself, but the pacing and story were horrid.
Add it back to SW, and the Sith life transfer/dyad nonsense is as much an affront to Lucas’s story as TLJ Luke. Possibly more: sure, doing that to Luke was shit, but TRoS butchered basic Force principles. It’s like a bad DM fucking up a pivotal NPC vs fucking up the entire game system.
I dislike both of them nearly equally, but I could probably watch 8 again. 9 is like an indecisive amateur’s attempt at Lego Star Wars machinima, down to poor editing and an inability to order scenes. Didn’t see another movie so sloppy until Thor: Love and Thunder.
I knew it was bad news the minute they did that whole “can you hear me bit” at the beginning between Hux and Poe. It was clearly them forcing marvel level humor into star wars and it felt sooo stupid.
It’s like the exact opposite of Han on the intercom in the first ( or fourth) movie. There Han knows he’s messed up and tries to play it up, but the bluff is immediately called. The humor is in the ridiculousness of the attempt. With Hux, it’s played the opposite and it just raises more questions about how Hux and the First Order ever became a serious threat.
As someone not interested in star wars I can’t wait for in ten 10 years time when suddenly liking the sequel trilogy is cool just like how the prequels were hated then became cool to like.
It’s like poetry, it rhymes
I think there’s a difference between how they were hated and what parts people liked.
The prequels people hate because Jar-Jar, and some other comic relief characters, were annoying, and also (especially episode 1) how slow they can be. Overall, the stories were liked I think.
The sequels people like for the action and entertainment, but you totally have to ignore the story for them to not fall apart. It constantly contradicts itself (and the existing lessons, like the OP) and only works to weaken the universe.
Basically, their opposites to each other. I think the difference is people can come to enjoy the world of the prequels and get past the bad bits (or skip them), but the analysis and growing recognition of the failures of the sequels will only get larger with time as we spend more time with them.
It’s not just Jar-Jar. The amount of CG and green screen was off-putting given how good Lucas was at practical effects, and those more modern techniques have aged much worse in a much shorter time frame. The movies may be slow, but the action sequences are actually quite long, drawn out, and pointless (the third act of Attack of the Clones is especially bad). The fight choreography was also extremely different, with the simple, grounded light saber fights being replaced with silly back-flips and summersaults.
There are also odd story elements that seem to contradict the OT; why did Obi-Wan say Yoda trained him? How did the Jedi go from being a powerful peace-keeping force known throughout the galaxy to a myth in 20 years? Why did Leah claim she could remember her mother? (I’m sure Lucas came up with explanations for these things, but they still stand out.) All in all, they are a huge tone-shift from their predecessors, in both storytelling and filmmaking.
In contrast, the sequel films are able to emulate the original trilogy much more faithfully in terms of practical effects and set design. The real problem was, where Lucas over-developed his prequel trilogy for 30 years, Disney under-developed their sequels, with no plan for where the story should go. Abrahams created a basic retread of the first film, Johnson threw everything out in the second, and the third film was just desperately trying to write itself out of a corner. Those movies had no idea where they wanted to go, so they went nowhere.
Episode 1 is slow?! It starts with jedis being betrayed by the trade federation, escaping the ship and going to naboo, rescuing jarjar and meeting the gungans, crossing the planet’s core to get to Theed, rescuing Padmé and escaping to tatooine, winning the podrace and going to coruscant, then finally returning to naboo to end the invasion of the trade federation, all in one film. How can it be more packed with action and events? Certainly more action and event packed than Luke spending 1h of the film in a swamp
The sequels people like for the action and entertainment
I have the same feeling but for prequels.
I never took Star Wars very seriously and I always see the story and lore as being a fun adventure. But the problem with the sequels is that it doesn’t have the direction and vision. I don’t know about the others, but for me that made the sequels not click.
I’d be curious indeed what people in ten years will say about the sequel trilogy. But I have a strong feeling that it will still be disliked, because it did not have a vision and is a jigsaw mess unlike the prequels. The latter has a vision at least (thanks to Lucas still being at the helm), in spite of the cringey parts. The sequels did not have him and Disney just simply wants to milk the Star Wars IP which made sequels such a bore.
Just like the prequels
Universally hated but then kids who grew up with it became adults
George Lucas said he wanted the prequels to be more like a children’s story, which explains a lot. I am one of those kids who enjoyed the prequels, but even at the time I saw some flaws but didn’t mind it. I always viewed the Star Wars as an adventure story and should not be taken as seriously. A competent enough creative team should be able to suspend the audience’s disbelief.
The original trilogy is better of course, but the prequels still has a sense of direction and vision. The sequels never had that with too many “creative” visions hampering each other. The sequels suffered from the case of having too many cooks in the kitchen but none of them have any plans whatsoever.
Did the prequels actively try to undo one another? 8 tries to fix 7 and 9 tries to fix 8 which makes for a sloppy trilogy
The prequels had a mountain of books/comics/shows backing them up and filling out the parts that were lacking. ( i.e. the huge gapping holes in tone and execution ).
The sequels… there’s not much to salvage. They’re more very pretty hole than substance. To the point there haven’t been more than a handful of attempts and they’ve basically been ignored/sidestepped.
The prequels are bad movies. But they tell an interesting story and have a unique setting. The sequels are also bad movies, but they’re a disjointed chaotic mess that just rehashes the original trilogy. There’s nothing to redeem.
Also, the prequels had fun and interesting world building. Look at games like battlefront and fallen order or all the new aliens we were introduced to.
The prequels made star wars feel larger than the original trilogy, the Sequels made the world feel smaller. No new alien race that plays a big role, no new worlds of interest (maybe the red salt planet, but it’s a barren wasteland), no new ships or technology.
Unlike the prequels (spanning decades, wars, and planets) the Sequels don’t have anything to build off of to save them.
It’s so frustrating too because the atmosphere, casting, acting, even the characters are really compelling. But they just absolutely refused to take any risks. It’s like they just didn’t get the whole point. Rey needed to become a gray character, and kylo needed to be redeemed. And they both had to live with it and shoulders the burdens of their past. Luke needed to accept that ultimately people are people and you can’t expect to entirely subvert either your baser or more noble emotions and instincts.
So much clumsy and lazy storytelling, taking shortcuts on one side, astronomically improbable coincidences to abruptly thrust the plot forward, baffling detours into shenanigans filler material that leads nowhere special, just to justify a visual sequence or to sell toys.
There’s some great ideas in there, as well as the unpopped kernels of other great ideas. So much unfulfilled potential, with tantalizing, infuriating glimpses of what could have been.
It’s like Lucas cracked the code with Empire Strikes Back, with a team of equals all working together and ready to push back on questionable ideas and impulses… then Lucas never tried that workflow again.
Then Disney fumbled the ball by allowing the goddamned “mystery box” approach, by requesting a misguided thing, summed up in the following sentence - “That thing you did with Star Trek… do it with Star Wars!”
Nah, man. The scene people whine about is the equivalent of Luke wailing on Vader, getting that sweet, sweet hand vengeance, and then stopping to think about what it all means. In TLJ it’s just compressed into like 3 seconds. In-universe, it’s bad luck. In narrative terms, Ben was in a different point on his character arc.
I love The Last Jedi. It twisted ESB just enough not to be a carbon copy, it eliminated a very boring villain in a surprising way, it made the seductive power of the dark side seem almost plausible (one of a smallish number of things The Acolyte actually did pretty well), actually engaged with the prequels in a substantive and respectful way, and left things open ended enough that Episode 9 could have been really interesting. Yoda’s appearance and interaction with Luke was amazing. That opening scene with Rose’s sister in the bomber was extremely moving for how little we knew, a “tone poem” if you will.
On the negative side, Finn’s arc was too subtly different from his Ep7 arc to make much difference. The logistics of the slow speed chase were a bit strained. We as the audience could have been clued into Holdo earlier than Poe was. The “your mom” joke didn’t land. The pacing (and I maintain pretty much only the pacing) of Canto Bight was weak. Then, it could have used a line or two of handwavium at various points to keep the Ackshully’s at bay: “The Raddus’ navicomputer locked onto the hyperdrive tracker.” Boom! Two birds with one stone.
It was still by far the best of the sequels and I’ll live and die on the hill that they’re all (yes, even THAT one) easier to watch than the acting and directing shitshow that was the prequels.
Nah, man. The scene people whine about is the equivalent of Luke wailing on Vader, getting that sweet, sweet hand vengeance, and then stopping to think about what it all means. In TLJ it’s just compressed into like 3 seconds. In-universe, it’s bad luck. In narrative terms, Ben was in a different point on his character arc.
If it worked for you, more power to you, I don’t expect to change anyone’s mind on this. But I can’t help myself when I see the apologetics for the “Luke ignited his light saber over a bad premonition scene”.
It’s not just “bad luck”, it’s bad writing. Luke didn’t just “wail on Vader” to get that “sweet hand vengeance”. He initially turned himself in believing he could convert his father back to the light. He only attacked after extreme emotional manipulation from one of the most powerful Sith Lords ever, during an active battle to determine the fate of all his friends, all they fought for, and the literal freedom of the Galaxy. That is a far reach from a moment of pure safety where he had a bad premonition and the “threat” was sleeping.
The whole explanation of this scene (and by extension the plot point that the core of the ST hinges on) assumes Luke not only learned nothing from successfully turning Vader back to the light, but actively learned the opposite lesson.
I get that people can change over time, and not always for the better, but this is just hands down terrible character writing. Making such drastic changes in such an iconic character, without spending any time developing those changes, having those changes be directly counter to the lessons the character supposedly learned during his primary arc, and then using this unexplained change as the catalyst to the entire ST is awful writing.
And we are not even touching on his new found love of “THE SACRED TEXTS!”, or how he completely gives up and goes hermit mode.
I’ll give Rian credit for actually trying to innovate when it was his turn at bat, but his handling of Luke was honestly some of the most egregious examples of not understanding the characters you are writing, and having them pick up the idiot stick just to move the plot forward.
The whole explanation of this scene (and by extension the plot point that the core of the ST hinges on) assumes Luke not only learned nothing from successfully turning Vader back to the light, but actively learned the opposite lesson.
This really pisses me off and Disney have to carry that shit.
The jedi of the prequel/originals are wrong about emotions/feelings and Lukes prove then wrong when he saves Anakin. But because of this fuck up writing now Lukes is a dumb removed who got luck in the originals and is doomed to failed like the others jedis. We already saw that in the Boba Fett series when he gives up on Grogu because “too much attachment” come on dude.
It’s not just “bad luck”, it’s bad writing. Luke didn’t just “wail on Vader” to get that “sweet hand vengeance”. He initially turned himself in believing he could convert his father back to the light. He only attacked after extreme emotional manipulation from one of the most powerful Sith Lords ever, during an active battle to determine the fate of all his friends, all they fought for, and the literal freedom of the Galaxy. That is a far reach from a moment of pure safety where he had a bad premonition and the “threat” was sleeping.
In both cases, Luke was doing his calm thing, acting how he thought a Jedi should, and trying to do everything the right way. In both cases, the forces of darkness were pushing at him, and in both cases he comes close to giving in to save lives but stops himself. With Ben, or really with Palpatine/Snoke (still hate that this was the direction JJ went in TROS) the fear part only lasts for a moment, but with terrible consequences. Luke had mostly learned. He wasn’t the same person, but when confronted with the same pressures he’d struggled in the OT, he had a moment where it came close. I didn’t find it out of character at all, just a case of not becoming a magical, perfect person after your period of most intense growth.
I think there’s an argument that we simply shouldn’t bring back iconic, archetypal heroes like that, but once the choice is made, it’s deeply uninteresting to have to be saints. As a commentary on teaching and aging and how trying to live up to the legacy of the Jedi as he knew them, I thought TLJ Luke was solid.
The “sacred texts” showed us that he was never truly as disillusioned as he wanted to make out, and that there was still a kid somewhere inside that understood the power of legend and legacy, and it informed his decision to help how he did.
Different aspects of these movies hit people in different ways, and I’m not really thinking I’ll convince many people either, but I’ll push back on the notion that it was “just” bad writing. TLJ had a point of view and an agenda, and I came out of it refreshed and optimistic and was genuinely taken aback at the backlash.
Far be it from me to denounce some joy you found in the movie. We both obviosuly like StarWars (fellow geeks!), and if you liked TLJ’s take, you do you.
I agree whole heartedly that it would be uninteresting to make Luke “saint-like”. My issue isn’t with him having flaws and room for growth.
But I stand by the fact that his “mistake” in the ST runs directly contrary to the central theme of and lesson learned in his original arc. It may have been “in character” for ESB Luke, but by the end of RotJ, he had been shown that the goodness in a person can overcome the darkness, even in Vader.
And TLJ didn’t spend any time developing his actions, it just kinda said “well, his central arc wasn’t as impactful as it seemed”. Which I do believe is lazy/bad writing.
To blatantly plagerize Wikipedia.
A character arc is the transformation or inner journey of a character over the course of a story. If a story has a character arc, the character begins as one sort of person and gradually transforms into a different sort of person in response to changing developments in the story. Since the change is often substantive and leading from one personality trait to a diametrically opposite trait (for example, from greed to benevolence), the geometric term arc is often used to describe the sweeping change.
Luke’s arc saw him learn to see and believe in the godness inside people, even when no one else could. Better writing would have pushed into his transformation, or found a previously unexplored flaw to examine. Having characters need to learn the same lessons over and over again is not only frustrating, it’s lazy writing and poor character development.
To that point, I once heard a youtuber recommend an alternative reason for Luke’s fall that would have leaned into this defining characteristic. They suggested that Luke still get the premonition regarding Ben, but believe the goodness in Ben could overcome the darkness. When Ben inevitably falls to the darkside, this could cause Luke to have a crisis of faith, fundamentally putting the plot in the same spot as the beginning of TLJ, but in a way that played off of Luke’s defining moment, as opposed to grinding against it.
Now you would have had to explain Ben’s turn to the darkside, but I think “my uncle attacked me” is also kind of a weak reason to betray his parents anyway (and kill his father, and attempt to kill his mother). And also fails to address his weird obsession with Vader, like that was just kind of glossed over.
Anyway, thanks for coming to my TED talk.
I think the main issue is that Rian had to cover for the hermit Luke set up in the previous movie, which he did not write.
Nah the hermit Luke in the episode 7 uses white clothes like a hopeful figure. In the 8 he uses it for 1s, throws the lightsaber and promptly walks to a tree and changes into a grey miserable figure. Rian chooses it.
I’m with you 100% on everything you wrote here and I’ve had this argument with my brother countless times. He blames Rian Johnson for everything bad about the sequels and it’s bs.
Personally I think the biggest thing TLJ suffered from was the split focus between Poe and Finn. It made both stories rushed or weak in various places.
And for that I blame Disney. Did you know that Poe wasn’t even supposed to be a big character? He was supposed to be in the first scene of Ep7 and that’s it. But execs saw his performance and insisted they needed his character to play a bigger role. As such, we get attention split between Poe and Finn and both suffer for it.
I feel awful for John Boyega who was such a massive Star Wars fan, got the role of his dreams, and then effectively got sidelined for a pretty-boy.
If only Rian Johnson hasn’t sidelined Finn, yet another way he fucked up TLJ
To my knowledge it wasn’t his decision. It was Kathleen Kennedy. Poe was a favorite among kids and helped sell a boatload of X-Wing toys. He was seen as the “Han Solo of the sequels” and Disney execs all but forced Rian to give him screen time. They couldn’t really reduce Rey’s role so Finn got screwed
Nah, man. The scene people whine about is the equivalent of Luke wailing on Vader, getting that sweet, sweet hand vengeance, and then stopping to think about what it all means. In TLJ it’s just compressed into like 3 seconds. In-universe, it’s bad luck. In narrative terms, Ben was in a different point on his character arc.
If they had chosen to show the dreams, Luke struggling with it for ages and that scene as a last resort failure I could agree with you. Like he wake up everyday and each day he go closer to Kylo’s bed, the scene could be awesome. In the movie looks like the little shit Luke became a weak mind Jedi.
Agreed on TLJ, it was the only part of the new trilogy that dared do something different. It was quite flawed, but hey, it’s Star Wars.
People don’t remember how much backlash there was at even Empire Strikes Back! They said the story was incoherent. They even criticized the quintessential “I am your father” plot twist as being ridiculous (rightfully so). But that’s kind of what makes Star Wars what it is.
