Some thoughts after a second viewing.
I really needed a second viewing to get a proper feel for this movie. The first time was simply overwhelming, in terms of how much there is to process and the level of expectation that goes with a Star Wars movie.
This is a dense movie. I don’t think there was really any down time. Every moment is filled with some element of story, dialogue, character, etc. Overall, this is a good thing. The movie earns its run time, in contrast to something like the Transformers movies where it’s baffling that they’re over 2.5 hours long, since story and character are almost non-existant.
Having said that, it felt a bit exhausting. The Force Awakens had a few slow moments, just hanging out with Rey in the desert for example. This movie might have benefited from some slower moments.
The major set pieces were great. The opening of Poe versus the Star Destroyer was great, as was the throne room battle and battle of Crait. This movie has the big Star Wars action set pieces I expect, and they’re right up there with the rest of the films.
I love the scene where Luke tells Rey to feel the force and then rubs her hand with the grass. The movie could have used a few more genuinely funny moments. I still cringe at the Porg looking at Chewie with puppy dog eyes. A sad porg seeing his friend and/or relative being eaten is supposed to be funny? It’s also too cartoony, reminding me of Puss In Boots doing the same thing in Shrek.
C3P0 was overused in the prequels, but I wish he had a bit more substance here. It seemed like every time he appeared it was only to be a punchline.
I know this isn’t a formal military organization, but Leia and Holdo seem overly fond of Poe at the end, despite the fact he just committed armed mutiny.
Could it be shorter? Maybe. The Finn/Rose subplot is less effective on second viewing because you know it’s going to end in failure. I think it’s a reason the movie dragged a bit until the throne room scene. I still think it should be in the movie because it’s unpredictable to see the heroes fail sometimes and it expands the scope of the movie from just being Luke/Rey and the Resitance cruiser. The casino scene was a nice change of scenery.
If the heroes are always successful, it becomes predictable and unrealistic. Rogue One suffered from this, where every character had an important task to perform, did so, and then was promptly killed off.
Yoda is a mixed bag. I know most people probably prefer old school puppet Yoda, but he didn’t look right. He wasn’t Phantom Menace bad by a long shot, but I’d have been fine with CGI Yoda. The character has an amusing side (as when he pokes fun at Obi-Wan for losing a planet in Attack of the Clones) but they took it a little too far here, with Yoda thrashing around like a toddler.
I thought using lightning made ghost Jedi potentially too powerful, but I see now it was more of a weather control thing. Still kind of silly and/or overpowered? He also interacted physically with Luke, so it will be interesting to see what they do with Luke in the next movie.
Yoda’s presence was justified as a way to make Luke understand that failure is not cause to give up, but something to learn and grow from. You’d think he’d have appeared to make his case for bringing Rey into the Jedi fold BEFORE she flew away though.
Luke’s story arc will be debated for years to come. I had no problem with it. I understand why some people think that Luke should have been more heroic, but I’m fine with this direction as well. It works because they do a good job of explaining his actions. It didn’t feel arbitrary or random. Mark Hamill did an excellent job as well, so I bought into the character’s story.
I really feel like they’ve set things up to tell a substantive story in Episode 9. This should be a nice contrast to Return of the Jedi, which had virtually no story to tell. Other than Luke confronting Vader, nothing of substance happened. It was merely a big action finale to the trilogy, and a bad movie to boot.
Overall, I loved the action scenes, I loved everything with Luke and Rey, I liked the main Resistance storyline, and the Finn storyline was okay.
As I write these comments I feel like I’m being very critical, but I really liked the movie. The things that worked for me worked really well, enough so to make up for things that didn’t work so great.
I like this movie, and at this point I rank it below A New Hope and Empire. I think the Force Awakens is a more enjoyable movie in some ways, but it’s because it played it so safe. The Last Jedi has a lot of elements that are divisive and generate debate, but I think that’s a good thing. I like that the movie surprised me and didn’t play to expectations.
