Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker

[DisneyJedi]

Also, for John’s sake, I hope he makes amends for his rather... off-color comments. Otherwise, he’s going to end up seriously harming his own career.

[JeanGreyForever]

To be honest, I think it was either incarceration or death for Kylo Ren/Ben when it comes to his character arc. He’s massacred hundreds of people, including his fellow Jedi and many innocent citizens, along with his own father. I know many people loved him and his arc, but they can’t just overlook his atrocities.

Also, what continuity was destroyed exactly?

He hasn't massacred hundreds of people. That would be more true of Darth Vader who had over two decades to kill and was constantly claiming lives. The biggest issue fans had with Kylo Ren was killing Han Solo, and Han forgives him even in TFA and TROS reiterates this. There's also a huge distinction between Kylo Ren and Ben Solo.

Ben hasn't killed any of "his fellow Jedi." The Rise of Kylo Ren comic series reveals that the fire at Luke's temple wasn't his fault and he didn't kill the other Jedi. Ben has also been targeted since he was in the womb by Palpatine and essentially preyed upon by the deadliest predator of the Star Wars universe, essentially the devil incarnate himself, all because of his bloodline. Poor Ben never had a chance especially when you factor in his family hiding his heritage from him and Ben learning the hard way that he was Darth Vader's grandson and his family kept this from him because they feared him. He was literally sent away from his parents at the age of 10 because he couldn't control his powers, which turns out to be because that was the same year that Rey, the other half of him, was born and this caused his powers to manifest.

Han Solo himself tells Ben that Kylo Ren is dead and his son stands before him. When Rey stabs him and then heals him above the waters of Kef Bir, Kylo Ren was dead and it was Ben Solo brought back, hence why even the scar Rey inflicted on him disappears. This was Leia's final act to save her son and she succeeds and Palpatine recognizes this as well.

The sudden introduction of Beaumont Kin which causes Rose and Connix to be sidelined. Palpatine's return was technically a retcon (and confirmed to not have been originally planned) although I don't really mind this and I'm glad he's back. Rey's Palpatine heritage was a huge retcon which really infuriated the Story Group amongst other things. JJ and Chris Terrio literally threw aside the Story Group which is why there are so many inconsistencies amongst the canon now and also why they are not a fan of the film or JJ himself. They much prefer Rian Johnson who actually worked with them to craft the story of TLJ. Apparently Lucasfilm split between the pro-JJ camp and the pro-RJ camp.

Also, for John’s sake, I hope he makes amends for his rather... off-color comments. Otherwise, he’s going to end up seriously harming his own career.

He hasn't apologized and a source that works for Lucasfilm said that John Boyega's attitude soured after TFA and TLJ. He apparently was very much a diva for TROS and very cliquey with JJ Abrams and his poor disposition and treatment of fans has turned away a lot of people. His off-color remarks about Disney make me wonder if Disney would ever bother to bring him back because he seems a loose cannon who really needs to control his tongue because if Disney, arguably the most powerful studio in the world can't handle him, why would any other studio or director feel comfortable hiring him?

[JeanGreyForever]

You should also read Resistance Reborn set between TLJ and TROS. Here is a passage below which shows that the Resistance welcomed with open arms an ex-Imperial who was responsible for killing the brother of a new recruit. When the recruit wants revenge, the rest of the Resistance makes very clear that they aren't here for that. The author endorsed this passage to show that Ben would be welcomed with open arms as well.
https://twitter.com/RoanhorseBex/status ... 5840738304

[Rumpelstiltskin]

Perhaps Kylo Ren/Ben would have been welcomed, but not general Hux. He blew up a whole planet, killing billions. And his reason for betrayal was entirely selfish and petty, which I actually found refreshing. I only found it annoying how randomly he was killed off.

Yes, the whole Palpatine return was a retcon, but that's not the first time. As mentioned, Luke and Leia was never meant to be siblings (Luke practically falls in love with Leia when he sees her message to Obi-Wan, and she later kisses Luke on her lips), and Darth Vader was never supposed to be their father. Also the midi-chlorians seems like a retcon. Lucas even wanted the sequel trilogy to be about the midi-chlorians. I would actually like to see a sci-fi trioligy like that, but it would have to take place outside the Star Wars universe, or made as a non-canon Star Wars story.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/erikkain/2 ... wo-movies/

“[The next three Star Wars films] were going to get into a microbiotic world. But there’s this world of creatures that operate differently than we do. I call them the Whills. And the Whills are the ones who actually control the universe. They feed off the Force… If I’d held onto the company I could have done it, and then it would have been done. Of course, a lot of the fans would have hated it, just like they did Phantom Menace and everything, but at least the whole story from beginning to end would be told.”

“Back in the day, I used to say ultimately what this means is we were just cars, vehicles for the Whills to travel around in….We’re vessels for them. And the conduit is the midichlorians. The midichlorians are the ones that communicate with the Whills. The Whills, in a general sense, they are the Force… All the way back to—with the Force and the Jedi and everything—the whole concept of how things happen was laid out completely from [the beginning] to the end. But I never got to finish. I never got to tell people about it.”

If more time had been given, maybe we would have been given a slightly different film:

https://www.cinemablend.com/news/248781 ... ce-awakens

Maryann Brandon told The Rough Cut Podcast that they had three months less in post-production than what was given for The Force Awakens. That meant, she said, that they were editing while The Rise of Skywalker was still being filmed.

I think I also read somewhere that JJ Abrams was barely able to complete the movie before the release.

There are so many rumors about the production that it is hard to say what's true or not, but it does sound like there was a lot of problems and disagreements involved. A minor example is Babu Frik, that was almost left out because Disney was adfraid he could end up as the new Jar Jar Binks.

Dominic Monaghan says:

https://www.digitalspy.com/movies/a3040 ... ctors-cut/

"Like a lot of Star Wars fans, I'm hoping there will be a director's cut so we'll get to see more and more of the stuff that was filmed."

"I wasn't there all the time, but even in the short time that I was there, there was so much stuff filmed that didn't make it to the theatrical version.

"I remember texting J.J. at the end of certain days and saying, 'Oh my God, I can't wait to see that'. It was just extraordinary to even just be involved in that scene, and unfortunately, with the time constraints, they didn't make it or they changed things around.

"So, I'm hoping that if and when the DVD comes out that maybe they'll add extras or they'll have deleted, additional scenes."

"Another thing that we will hopefully see at some point in the future is that in the final battle, Connix injures her leg. Obviously, myself, Rose and Connix are exiting the battle, and Rose has a weapon."

"While Rose is busy doing stuff, I grab Connix's arm and put it over my shoulder to make sure that all of us come back as unscathed as possible."

[JeanGreyForever]

I agree with you about Hux. What a lot of people don't realize is that TFA novelization confirmed that Kylo Ren was against the use of Starkiller Base from the very beginning but it was a project that Snoke and Hux supported. And Hux comes across as very genocidal and Nazi-like in TFA especially. I wish he hadn't been killed off so quickly too but he had have more scenes in the first half of the film which were cut which I think is why his role seems so truncated in the final film. It would have worked better to see more of his rivalry with Kylo and Pryde.

Palpatine's return isn't a terrible retcon because it was seeded as far back as ROTS when Palpatine remarked on the ability to cheat death. He even reuses one of those lines word for word in this film. Not to mention, he was brought back in the comics (Dark Empire) in Legends and George Lucas approved that. What people also don't realize is back when George Lucas planned on making a sequel trilogy, before he sold SW to Disney, the first three people he brought together to inform about his plans were Mark Hamill, Carrie Fisher, and Ian McDiarmid. Ian McDiarmid has been saying that George Lucas would never have brought back Palpatine but I find that hard to believe when Ian was one of the first people George met with about his ST plans. Not to mention, George once stated that Dark Empire was the closest to his plans for a ST and Dark Empire revolves around Palpatine's return. In fact, I highly recommend that ST fans read that because there are a lot of Dark Empire parallels to these films, particularly TLJ and TROS. I was always a huge Dark Empire fan, which was pretty controversial back in the day for bringing back Palpatine and briefly turning Luke to the dark side, which may also be why I've had little to no issues with the current films.

I think even in alternate footage of the bridge swing scene in ANH, Leia flat out kisses Luke. The deleted scene from TESB pushes them closer as romantic rivals. It's funny how a series that centers around one family was never really about a family in the first place. ANH just had Luke with a few references to his deceased father. TESB is what made Darth Vader his father and ROTJ is when Leia became his sister. It's similar to how with Rey's background, we get little pieces throughout the trilogy. TLJ tells us that Rey's parents were nobodies and then TROS goes one step further and tells us that while this was true, Rey's grandparent was actually important. It also completes the Dyad between Rey and Ben both having grandfathers who represented the ultimate evil but while Rey came from the dark and turned light, Ben came from the light and turned dark. Palpatine spends all the years after the OT trying to turn the last Skywalker to the dark side and he succeeds in getting his revenge on the Skywalker family who bested him over and over, but even then, the Skywalkers take in his granddaughter and accept her with open arms, turning her into the champion of the light side who ultimately chooses them as her family and even takes her name. So it's all perfectly balanced as it should be (although Ben should have survived in the end).

Yeah, I've read those comments GL made about midichlorians and that just further confirms that all those fans who are crying for him to come back would be saying the same thing towards Disney, if GL had made the ST. They'd never be happy and always wish another path would be taken which they would hate just as much. GL himself admitted that the fans would have hated his ST like they hated his PT. Most of the rest of his core ideas still made it into the final films like a female protagonist abandoned and alone on a planet who goes to meet an exiled Jedi Master Luke Skywalker.

I think there's another interview where they confirm that if they had been able to, they'd still have been editing the movie past the deadline and it was essentially released unfinished. Even all the continuity errors in the ending which make people think Ben was supposed to live have been "confirmed" as just shoddy editing and a rush-job. Don't know if I believe that or not but I'm also skeptical if Ben was supposed to live or not. An inside source with LFL claims that was never the case and I'm inclined to believe most of his information and I also don't see Disney as being stupid enough to plan to keep the character alive, only to change it last minute. What I do believe is what the source said that Ben was always going to die but Disney/Lucasfilm freaked out when the leaks were on the Internet months in advance and the whole fanbase was unanimous in their anger at Ben's death. By that point, it was too late for them to change things but apparently they are very well-aware at the mistake they made.

Funny they felt that way about Babu Frik since he got some of the most laughs and cheers in the audience and people seem to unanimously love him.

I've always wanted to see more Rose and Connix stuff even if I don't like Beaumont Kin (Dominic Monaghan's character) very much. I'm glad to see a cast member encouraging an extended edition and since Dominic is a huge friend of JJ, he better use that clout of his so JJ can use his clout to get an extended edition release. If not theatrically, then at least on home video, although they really should do what Endgame did and release an extended version theatrically to boost the box office. Especially if it's more than one measly little end-credits scene but actual substantial scenes (like 20-40 minutes worth).

[JeanGreyForever]

BTW, there are actually a lot of hints seeded into the previous films that Rey was a Palpatine, whether that was the original intention or not.

Rey means king or ruler in Spanish. Her original name was Kira before this was changed for no apparent reason.

During Rey's vision in TFA, the only dark side character who speaks is Palpatine.



In TFA novel, after Rey defeats Kylo, an evil voice is chanting in her head to kill him. The script said she was on the verge of the dark side.



Also in TFA, she does a lunge move in her duel with Kylo which a lot of people said was reminescent of Palpatine in ROTS.

In TLJ, Luke says that Rey goes straight to the dark when she's confronted by the dark side cave.

https://twitter.com/mrjettlucas/status/ ... 7647326208
George Lucas' son said way back in 2016 that Rey's story paralleled Anastasia's. Both are lost imperial princesses who are the daughters of emperors (a Russian tsar would essentially be an emperor hence why his wife is referred to as an empress).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8uvEtIWpLYI
John Williams' themes for Rey and Kylo Ren are connected to each other and both also are connected to Palpatine's theme.

[DisneyJedi]

Now all this talk of a JJ Abrams cut is making me want to watch said cut if it exists. It could give us a bit more insight on how the Emperor was able to come back in his form and maybe give us more scenes involving Rose seeing that she was given the short end of the stick in terms of character in this movie. Plus, I want to see more hints at Finn being Force sensitive.

[JeanGreyForever]

I wouldn't go as far as saying JJ cut. That's a bunch of nonsense that has been debunked by numerous sources, the idea that JJ had some grand 3 hour vision for the film which Disney cut down or reshot. JJ loves short, fast-paced films so the final product is very much the JJ cut already. Especially since in the last month, about 15-20 minutes were cut or so. There are a lot of deleted sequences and Disney/Lucasfilm should be smart enough to reinsert these scenes for a proper extended edition.

Especially when stuff like Palpatine's return was included in the deleted scenes but cut because they didn't want too much exposition (sounds like classic JJ).

Other confirmed deleted scenes besides the explanation of Palpatine's return include:

Rey and Rose

At least two Leia scenes (possibly featuring Rose?)
-one of these might be Leia holding Han's medal from the first teaser

Kylo meeting the Oracle who explains the Dyad and sends him to Mustafar to find the Wayfinder in Vader's castle (only confirmed from the leaks so far)

Hux and Pryde on Mustafar commenting on Kylo searching for the Wayfinder

A photo shows Hux with Kylo and the Knights of Ren on the Star Destroyer

The subplot of the First Order kidnapping the children of Rebel heroes, including Lando revealing that he had a child taken from him (leading to the Lando-Jannah reunion at the end)

Rose, Connix, and Beaumont in the final battle with Connix getting injured

I think it's been suggested that there were more Hux/Pryde scenes cut. Also heard the same about more featuring Rose and R2 back at the Resistance base. Heard a rumor that a Kylo/Rey scene through the force bond was cut but I can't remember if that was from a false source or not. Concept art on Twitter popped up featuring Kylo visiting an imprisoned Chewbacca on the Star Destroyer but I don't know if this was ever scripted or shot. Anthony Daniels said in his book that the characters had scenes battling the Knights of Ren on Kijimi so there might be more deleted footage here with action sequences with the Knights of Ren.

Also the leaks had scenes that were eventually reshot so they could potentially appear as deleted scenes. Like Luke and Leia appearing as force ghosts to help Ben and Rey battle Palpatine, Luke coming to Leia on her deathbed to teach her her final Jedi lesson on how to become a force ghost, Rey wanting to see force ghost Leia when she goes to Ahch-To but Luke tells her that Leia hasn't fully crossed over yet (this explains the reshoots with Luke and why in some shots he has that awful wig but in others, he has his real hair), more footage of the flashback of Luke training Leia as a Jedi which was meant to originally open the film, and an alternate ending where Rey was on Tatooine with the rest of the major characters and not alone with BB-8. Matt Smith apparently also played a young Palpatine so I'm not sure if his scenes were filmed or not.

[JeanGreyForever]

TROS has three BAFTA nominations.

[JeanGreyForever]

Adam Driver gave a big thank you to all the Star Wars fans who donated to his foundation in honor of Ben Solo.
https://twitter.com/AITAF/status/121460 ... ank-you%2F

Fans have donated more than $50,000 since before the film even premiered after the spoilers of Ben's fate came out. Unlike the toxic haters of TLJ who campaigned for the film to be remade, harassed the director and actors on social media, and created fanedits removing any female characters, this is what Ben Solo and Reylo fans accomplished.

[Rumpelstiltskin]

Some has questioned what the point with the Starkiller Base was when Palpatine already had a fleet of ships able to destroy planets. The only answer I can think of is that the Starkiller could be used from far away and was a lot more powerful, while the device in the ships had to be relatively close to the planet. Or that they came up with a technological breakthrough at a point when the Starkiller base was already under contstruction. We'll see if the extra material give some explanation.

Just a thought; in the first movie of the new triology, directed by J.J. Abrams, Kylo Ren has his helmet. In the next movie, directed by Rian Johnson, Snoke tells him to "take that ridiculous thing off" and he ends up destroying it. In this film, once again directed by Abrams, he decides to fix his helmet.

From what I have heard, Darth Vader was only meant to be in the first movie, but he turned out to be so popular he was brought back for the sequels as well. After A New Hope, Star Wars' future was pretty open and could have gone in every direction. Rumors has it that back then Star Wars hadn't fully established itself as Star Wars, which is why we got the famous holiday special. And that George Lucas has never fully understood his own creation (with the ewoks used as an example), or what it was that made it popular amongst fans. And for the same reason, the prequel triology didn't deliver exactly what the fans wanted and expected.
(The original scripts went through god knows how many rewrites, as fans are probably aware of. I think that at some point the Force was meant to be some crystals that were worshipped, and much of the cast midgets (Lucas later got his midget movie with Willow).)
As mentioned before, my personal opinion is that the original Marvel comics based on Star Wars should be used as a source of inspiration for future movies. Being a comic, they never had to worry about budget or effects and could make it as big as they wanted. And they could take it in all directions they wanted. Later comic book adaptations were given less free hands.
There is no doubt the negative feedback of the prequel triology really hurt Lucas, possibly crushing much of his spirit and enthusiams for his fictional universe. They made a lot of money, and he could probably have made his one sequel trilogy that also made money even if fans according to his own words would have hated that one as well. Which is probably some of the reasons why he sold it to Disney. But another reason for the backlash was because the rise of the internet. Back when the original triology was made, there was no WWW or social media. If there was, those movies too would no doubt what attracted trolls and haters. Without it, it was a lot harder for negative voices to reach the directors. I didn't even know that Howard the Duck was a flop and hated by the critics when I rented the movie as a kid. Perhaps with the exception of the guitar playing at the end, I liked it a lot.

Even if Disney considers Ben's death as a mistake, he could always return later as a force ghost. And speaking of force ghosts, I have wondered if there are any rules for how long they can hang out with living persons. Would a spinoff movie where one of the characters is a force ghost be possible? Obviously, no prison cells would be able to hold the heroes in that case, if their ghost friend could just open the door from the outside.

The fact that the Disney people were not able to tell the difference between Jar Jar Binks and Babu Frik says a lot. They are two completely different characters what personality is concerned.

Because much of Beaumont Kin's role was edited out, his presence just looks strange. His presence and the way he is filmed make us assume he is an important character, or will end up as being important, and yet he ends up as being nothing more than a talking head, a random background figure with a few lines. The same goes for Rose and Klaud. People who have not seen The Last Jedi would never have been able to guess that Rose had one of the main roles in that film.

Maybe they decided not to use Kira because they remembered that one of the main characters in The Dark Crystal has the same name.

[DisneyJedi]

I swear almost everybody is so freaking objective when it comes to the ST. And I know I’ve gone on before on this forum about how people these days are so negative and how there’s no pleasing them when it comes to anything Star Wars that’s not the unaltered OT, the Expanded Universe (which George Lucas didn’t consider canon to his own movies anyway despite approving the EU stories’ creations) or just the OT. For the record, Disney had nothing to do with the newer Star Wars films (outside of their presence in the parks), the stories and new films was all done by Lucasfilm, who wanted to go in a different direction in terms of story. Plus, even though SW put him and its stars on the map, it kind of ruined Lucas’s life in a way. He got divorced when working on Return of the Jedi. And don’t get me started on all the flack he got for the Special Editions of his OT and his prequel trilogy.

Is Star Wars oversaturated these days? Totally.

Does the ST have flaws? Yes.

Was it totally unnecessary? Yep.

Do I have a problem with them existing? No.

Besides, the original and prequel trilogies weren’t really perfect either. So people who are totally negative about how things are done now need to stop placing the unaltered OT and EU on such high pedestals. The fandom is so toxic these days, Jake Lloyd quit acting because he was bullied for his portrayal as Anakin in Episode I and I heard Hayden Christensen was afraid to make public appearances at any SW event.

[Rumpelstiltskin]

The audience don't get impressed by special and visual effects any more. The original King Kong and the Ray Harryhausen movies were once mindblowing, but those days are gone. And it has practically become a sport to look for things to criticize the more hyped and the bigger budget and expectations a movie has.
(Not that I don't point out things that stands out like a sore thumb myself is I'm exposed to them.)
Still, some disagreements and discussions has never hurt anyone. It's the toxic attitude that has been growing the last decade or two that has become a problem.

I also blame the tabloids. They are scrolling through the comments sections and posts on social media (like the toxic twitter) in search of negative comments. There they are cherry picking everything that can be used as clickbait for their articles, and use headlines like "Fans really hate the new movie", and then quote some posts they have found on the net. And then the snowball just starts rolling, sometimes assisted by talkshow hosts. To some degree, it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.

As for Disney and the new Star Wars movies, there are articles that claims Disney interfered with Abrams' work. So who knows.

Haven't heard about the Hayden Christensen thing before, but they say Ahmed Best was almost harassed to death. Something I had no idea about before recently. I admit that I was not a fan of Jar Jar Binks myself as well, without realizing others shared my opinion at the time, but the idea of trolling and pester the actors of characters I don't particularly like has never even crossed my mind.

[rodrigo_ca]

The sequel trilogy is the worst thing to have ever happened to Star Wars until the unpleasable Star Wars fans are given something new to hate and then they will say "oh good were the days of the sequel trilogy" like they're doing with the prequels just now.

[lord-of-sith]

The sequel trilogy is the worst thing to have ever happened to Star Wars until the unpleasable Star Wars fans are given something new to hate and then they will say "oh good were the days of the sequel trilogy" like they're doing with the prequels just now.

Ding ding ding! As a big Star Wars fan since I saw The Phantom Menace in theaters when I was 8-years-old, this is absolutely the truth. Nearly every single product Star Wars puts out gets absolutely eviscerated by the fandom, who hold a movie that was released 40 YEARS AGO now as the gold standard. Then, years go by, and people start to say "Well that was actually good compared to the crap they just made!"

The Empire Strikes Back was not a critical or audience success at the time it was released, especially compared to the original film it was following. It is well documented that audiences didn't seem ready for the dark tone it took, and how it left them on a cliffhanger for three years. Nowadays it's held as the second coming of cinema.

At the time of their release, and many years following, the prequels were considered the worst thing ever and tarnishing the legacy of Star Wars. The amount of articles and click-bait Youtube videos I see now praising the prequels as some kind of masterwork of cinema is wild. Those movies are disjointed and full of cringey writing and bad acting. Do they have their good moments? Absolutely. But let's not act like we're suddenly pining for the days of Jar-Jar Binks.

The sequel trilogy has faced some very fair criticism, but I've seen so many complaints that are completely unjustified. Personally, I think The Rise of Skywalker is a movie with some excellent moments, that overall is messy and too over-stuffed. I think they should have bit the bullet and re-cast Leia (there were rumors they were considering Meryl Streep) and finished the story as they wanted. The fact that they had to write around Fisher's pre-existing footage, as well as insert Han into a scene that was obviously supposed to be for Leia has a huge hindrance to the story. I get that Carrie IS Leia, and I miss her just as much as any other fan, but Leia's ending was unsatisfying because of the constraints they put themselves under.

At the end of the day, the problem with the Star Wars fandom as a whole is that too many people make Star Wars too much of their personality. I love Star Wars, but at the end of the day they are just movies. They mean a lot to me in terms of nostalgia and imagination, but a less-than-stellar installment is just that, a movie. I can take it for what it is (and I LOVED The Last Jedi, for what it's worth) and move on.

Anyway, looking forward to the sequel trilogy getting the praise it deserves in like a decade.

[rodrigo_ca]

I'm not a Star Wars fan, more like a casual viewer, and it's easy to see this trending behavior, but I had no idea it actually went back to Empire Strikes Back. Oh my, how things have changed and are still the same.

I agree with you completely regarding Leia. It's completely clear she's just saying stock phrases... like, her lines in Rise of Skywalker are super generic. And I understand why is that but I'll always wonder what if they chose to serve the character first instead of the actor - and in that, giving Carrie's legacy the ending it was supposed to get instead of keeping her alive for 10 unsatisfying minutes on screen and end it in an unsatisfying way too. Of course, we could have all hated it and be wishing they had gone the way it went now, but there's just no telling.

[JeanGreyForever]

Some has questioned what the point with the Starkiller Base was when Palpatine already had a fleet of ships able to destroy planets. The only answer I can think of is that the Starkiller could be used from far away and was a lot more powerful, while the device in the ships had to be relatively close to the planet. Or that they came up with a technological breakthrough at a point when the Starkiller base was already under contstruction. We'll see if the extra material give some explanation.

Just a thought; in the first movie of the new triology, directed by J.J. Abrams, Kylo Ren has his helmet. In the next movie, directed by Rian Johnson, Snoke tells him to "take that ridiculous thing off" and he ends up destroying it. In this film, once again directed by Abrams, he decides to fix his helmet.

From what I have heard, Darth Vader was only meant to be in the first movie, but he turned out to be so popular he was brought back for the sequels as well. After A New Hope, Star Wars' future was pretty open and could have gone in every direction. Rumors has it that back then Star Wars hadn't fully established itself as Star Wars, which is why we got the famous holiday special. And that George Lucas has never fully understood his own creation (with the ewoks used as an example), or what it was that made it popular amongst fans. And for the same reason, the prequel triology didn't deliver exactly what the fans wanted and expected.
(The original scripts went through god knows how many rewrites, as fans are probably aware of. I think that at some point the Force was meant to be some crystals that were worshipped, and much of the cast midgets (Lucas later got his midget movie with Willow).)
As mentioned before, my personal opinion is that the original Marvel comics based on Star Wars should be used as a source of inspiration for future movies. Being a comic, they never had to worry about budget or effects and could make it as big as they wanted. And they could take it in all directions they wanted. Later comic book adaptations were given less free hands.
There is no doubt the negative feedback of the prequel triology really hurt Lucas, possibly crushing much of his spirit and enthusiams for his fictional universe. They made a lot of money, and he could probably have made his one sequel trilogy that also made money even if fans according to his own words would have hated that one as well. Which is probably some of the reasons why he sold it to Disney. But another reason for the backlash was because the rise of the internet. Back when the original triology was made, there was no WWW or social media. If there was, those movies too would no doubt what attracted trolls and haters. Without it, it was a lot harder for negative voices to reach the directors. I didn't even know that Howard the Duck was a flop and hated by the critics when I rented the movie as a kid. Perhaps with the exception of the guitar playing at the end, I liked it a lot.

Even if Disney considers Ben's death as a mistake, he could always return later as a force ghost. And speaking of force ghosts, I have wondered if there are any rules for how long they can hang out with living persons. Would a spinoff movie where one of the characters is a force ghost be possible? Obviously, no prison cells would be able to hold the heroes in that case, if their ghost friend could just open the door from the outside.

The fact that the Disney people were not able to tell the difference between Jar Jar Binks and Babu Frik says a lot. They are two completely different characters what personality is concerned.

Because much of Beaumont Kin's role was edited out, his presence just looks strange. His presence and the way he is filmed make us assume he is an important character, or will end up as being important, and yet he ends up as being nothing more than a talking head, a random background figure with a few lines. The same goes for Rose and Klaud. People who have not seen The Last Jedi would never have been able to guess that Rose had one of the main roles in that film.

Maybe they decided not to use Kira because they remembered that one of the main characters in The Dark Crystal has the same name.

The Star Destroyers are based on the old Imperial designs rather than the First Order ones so it seems like Palpatine had that fleet ready for a while. Maybe the miniaturized Death Star tech was added later since we first hear about it in TLJ with the cannon on Crait. Starkiller was probably the public project Palpatine planned to unveil with the First Order's debut (like the Death Star) and the Star Destroyers would back it up.

The idea of the mask was that with Snoke gone, Kylo can go back to what he wanted to be and wear the mask. Rey points out that he's hiding behind the mask but she can see him clearly. Honestly, there's not much of a narrative purpose behind it since for a whole year he's without it and only recreates it after meeting Palpatine. Maybe it was to further cement the Vader legacy he's always wanted which Palpatine is offering again.

I haven't heard anything like that about Vader only being in one film but I do know the original SW film went through many variations and drafts so that could be possible. The Holiday Special was apparently encouraged as quick money which is why GL did it but he quickly regretted it. I don't see the issue with the Ewoks and like GL said, SW was always meant for kids. The Ewoks got some of the biggest cheers when they appeared for a few seconds in TROS. The PT I agree was all over the place and GL did not have anyone reining him in then. The OT turned out as well as it did because there were so many other people onboard besides GL, moderating him, and his wife at the time was mainly responsible for editing the first film and making it such a big hit.

I think the Kaiburr Crystals were supposed to amplify the Force. One appears in Splinter of the Mind's Eye, the original sequel GL planned if Star Wars was not a huge success and could only warant a low-budget sequel. It was made into a novelization.

I haven't read the Marvel comics from the 70s/80s but they seem pretty dated tbh.

GL sold SW to Disney because he was sick of being told that he had destroyed people's childhoods and he even said that his plans for the ST would not have been liked by the fans so he knew what the public reaction would be. Ironically enough he also recently said that his favorite SW film is TPM so you can imagine that reaction. TESB got a lot of bad reviews initially and fans had plenty of issues. I was reading an old fan magazine a few months before TESB came out, and a fan heard about the rumor that Darth Vader was Luke's father and he blew up, saying it would ruin the series for him and everyone else. A lot of people were mainly Luke/Leia shippers so they hated the idea of Han and Leia being together. TLJ haters try to deny how TESB was received by fans (and even critics) but the proof is all out there. ROTJ still has haters to this day for the Ewoks or the extended Tatooine sequence.

He didn't appear as a force ghost for a reason at the end. If Ben was meant to be one, they would have made him show up as one which tells me that they left it ambiguous on purpose to be able to bring him back one day. Most of the fan backlash for this film is about Ben's death and that includes critics and sources say that Disney is well aware of their mistake with this. He's also the most lucrative Disney Star Wars character, not to mention one of the major figures of their theme park, and consistently ranks as one of the most popular characters.
https://www.bleedingcool.com/2019/12/29 ... dy-origin/
https://www.comicsbeat.com/star-wars-ri ... -printing/
His latest origin comic series has been sold out and getting multiple printings so clearly there is a huge audience for him (issue 2 was even pushed a week early to capitalize on this). If Disney plans on continuing with the ST characters (which Kathleen Kennedy basically confirmed and they wouldn't create a whole theme park around them just to drop them), the only major characters they have who entered the public consciousness are Kylo and Rey (and BB-8).

I'm assuming there are rules about the balance of the Force and all and force ghosts will only materialize in the real world for a brief period of time because they are beyond the world of the living.

Lol, I agree with you about Jar Jar.

I always figured he was going to be a background supporting Resistance character but I didn't expect him to be almost as present as Rose and way more present than Connix. Not sure about Klaud either because he's barely onscreen.

[JeanGreyForever]

I swear almost everybody is so freaking objective when it comes to the ST. And I know I’ve gone on before on this forum about how people these days are so negative and how there’s no pleasing them when it comes to anything Star Wars that’s not the unaltered OT, the Expanded Universe (which George Lucas didn’t consider canon to his own movies anyway despite approving the EU stories’ creations) or just the OT. For the record, Disney had nothing to do with the newer Star Wars films (outside of their presence in the parks), the stories and new films was all done by Lucasfilm, who wanted to go in a different direction in terms of story. Plus, even though SW put him and its stars on the map, it kind of ruined Lucas’s life in a way. He got divorced when working on Return of the Jedi. And don’t get me started on all the flack he got for the Special Editions of his OT and his prequel trilogy.

Besides, the original and prequel trilogies weren’t really perfect either. So people who are totally negative about how things are done now need to stop placing the unaltered OT and EU on such high pedestals. The fandom is so toxic these days, Jake Lloyd quit acting because he was bullied for his portrayal as Anakin in Episode I and I heard Hayden Christensen was afraid to make public appearances at any SW event.

Well, Bob Iger has had a heavy hand in the new films. He says he watched the dailies everyday for at least TFA and TROS. He didn't want Adam Driver in the role (I think he wanted Eddie Redmayne instead but somebody else said Chris Pine) so Kathleen Kennedy had to fight hard to keep Adam since he was her choice. Solo's release date wasn't changed to Christmas because of him and he admitted that Solo's underperformance was his fault. Even TROS was supposed to be pushed back 6 months to a year but Iger refused to accommodate Kennedy yet again. For that matter, TFA was rushed into production and meant to be released in 2016 or 2017 but Iger demanded the 2015 release date. The reason we got the Christmas release date instead of May 2015 was because he compromised with Kennedy.

Not to mention Ahmed Best nearly committing suicide and Daisy Ridley and Kelly Marie Tran getting bullied off of social media. Although fan harassment can come from the actors themselves in the case of John Boyega. I've heard the stories about him on the set for TROS and they are not pleasant and his behavior during the promotional tour only corroborates all that. And even some actors like Natalie Portman said that her career was almost ruined in Hollywood because everybody hated her in Star Wars and felt she couldn't act.

The audience don't get impressed by special and visual effects any more. The original King Kong and the Ray Harryhausen movies were once mindblowing, but those days are gone. And it has practically become a sport to look for things to criticize the more hyped and the bigger budget and expectations a movie has.
(Not that I don't point out things that stands out like a sore thumb myself is I'm exposed to them.)
Still, some disagreements and discussions has never hurt anyone. It's the toxic attitude that has been growing the last decade or two that has become a problem.

I also blame the tabloids. They are scrolling through the comments sections and posts on social media (like the toxic twitter) in search of negative comments. There they are cherry picking everything that can be used as clickbait for their articles, and use headlines like "Fans really hate the new movie", and then quote some posts they have found on the net. And then the snowball just starts rolling, sometimes assisted by talkshow hosts. To some degree, it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.

As for Disney and the new Star Wars movies, there are articles that claims Disney interfered with Abrams' work. So who knows.

Haven't heard about the Hayden Christensen thing before, but they say Ahmed Best was almost harassed to death. Something I had no idea about before recently. I admit that I was not a fan of Jar Jar Binks myself as well, without realizing others shared my opinion at the time, but the idea of trolling and pester the actors of characters I don't particularly like has never even crossed my mind.

That's one of the reasons that SW is not the cultural phenomenon it used to be because it's no longer one of a kind. The PT had competition from Spider-Man, Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, etc. while the ST has mainly had to deal with Marvel. You can find visual effects in practically any blockbuster film now so the appeal is somewhat diluted.

I blame Disney for going by toxic fans and clickbait articles to shape their films. If the PT got too much flack for too much politics, exposition, and CGI, they went in the opposite end for TFA (although I think that worked for the better). When accused of making a remake of ANH, they decided to go with a completely new and subversive story which was TLJ. The toxic amounts of backlash to that made them decide to return to a derivative crowd-pleaser meant to cater to all the haters' complaints (a supposed Lucasfilm inside source said that Rose was purposefully sidelined because of this and they even have some sort of formula that tells them how to make the most crowd-pleasing movie which unfortunately didn't include Rose). Ironically this backfired by making all the fans of TLJ hate on TROS and some ST haters were never going to be won over in the first place.

All the articles about Disney interfering with Abrams come from malicious users trying to defame Disney and Rian Johnson more by making JJ out to be the victim. They were dubious sources which didn't have any credible information anyway and they've been debunked several times. There is no such thing as a JJ Cut beyond what we saw onscreen.

However, right now the film is tracking to make less than Rogue One. I wouldn't be surprised if Disney released an extended edition in theaters with deleted scenes to push the box office higher. I'd be all for this, especially if they went as far and changed the ending (I know that's 99% not going to happen but as our favorite space princess says, "hope is like the sun. If you only believe it when you see it you'll never make it through the night.")

[DisneyJedi]

Let’s face it. The ST haters are total brats and hypocrites. They complain about The Force Awakens being a rehash of A New Hope, yet when The Last Jedi goes in a different direction story wise, they gripe about that. They hate Rose as a character? Lucasfilm decides to make her role smaller in The Rise of Skywalker. And guess what? The ST haters whine about THAT! Make up your damn mind, people!

Anyways, I’ll be honest, I know Eddie Redmayne is an excellent actor, but I don’t think I could see him playing a dark and brooding character like Kylo Ren. Eddie comes off as more awkward and charming, which adds to his lovable performances and makes his acting seem a bit more natural. It’s part of why his acting in movies like Les Miserables and the Fantastic Beasts films come off as natural.

[Farerb]

Let’s face it. The ST haters are total brats and hypocrites. They complain about The Force Awakens being a rehash of A New Hope, yet when The Last Jedi goes in a different direction story wise, they gripe about that. They hate Rose as a character? Lucasfilm decides to make her role smaller in The Rise of Skywalker. And guess what? The ST haters whine about THAT! Make up your damn mind, people!

Anyways, I’ll be honest, I know Eddie Redmayne is an excellent actor, but I don’t think I could see him playing a dark and brooding character like Kylo Ren. Eddie comes off as more awkward and charming, which adds to his lovable performances and makes his acting seem a bit more natural. It’s part of why his acting in movies like Les Miserables and the Fantastic Beasts films come off as natural.

Can't you realize that the people who complained about Rose in TLJ and the ones who don't like her being sidelined are two different set of people?
Overall it's not people contradicting themselves. It's different people care about different things.