Star Wars: The Last Jedi - What Went Wrong? - Wisecrack Edition 

Disney :"Let the past die", Makes a han solo prequel the next year

Snoke to Ben: "You're no Vader." Me: And you're no Palpatine either.

Snoke gets Darth Mauled before we know anything about him. In other words, he gets Darth Mauled.

Rian Johnson "Let thr past die, kill it if you have to" Disneys first trailer for Episode 9 "hey, remember all these old star wars movies that got you to love star wars?! Well, it's now the entire first half of our trailer!"

Rian Johnson *Hits blunt: what if we make the new movie about subverting expectations so much that we subvert the subversions we created.

Agree 100%. Rey's refusal to let the old die was especially frustrating considering she had *already* turned Ren down in The Force Awakens. Why hit the same plot beat again in the next film? It's an anti-character arc.

I can't think of a better way to end this slow-motion train wreck: Jar Jar Binks was the puppet master all along.

I knew something was wrong the moment Mark Hamill said in an interview Rian was taking Luke in a direction he didn’t agree with, but he tried his best to work with that vision. That right there told me things were going to be bad, but I had no idea until I saw it.

If you are going to act like you are throwing the old stuff away at least have the balls to stick with the change at the end of the movie.

"That's not how the Force works!" - Nicely sums up the entire film.

I just feel like this whole new trilogy has no lovable and memorable characters.

Let the past die! Film Scroll: "A long time ago, in a galaxy far away..."

The Last Jedi's problem isn't that it's 'too ballsy'. The film had no balls at all. Leia dies? Nope, saved at the last minute. Finn dies? Nope, saved at the last minute. Rey has an interesting back story that sheds light on her character? Nope. Rey turns to the dark side? Nope, she's perfect. Finn and Rose's mission has important consequences? Nope, it has no impact on the story at all. Poe learns to be a leader? Nope, he's stripped of his position, talked down to and left with nothing to do. Akbar dies heroically and meaningfully? Nope, dies off-screen. Mentioned once in passing. Snoke established as a menacing character? Nope, killed almost immediately. Kylo Ren made redeemable? Nope, turns out he's determined to be as evil as possible without real reason. DJ's views on neutrality explored? Nope, turns out capitalism is just evil. Luke placed in danger? Nope, it was all an illusion. Luke dies meaningfully? Nope, Luke fades away without cause or reason. The story progresses to the next stage of their journey? Nope, at the end of TLJ the heroes are in the same position as they were at the start of the film - on the run from the First Order, except a few extras died in between. Ultimately, The Last Jedi is about nothing, goes nowhere and contributes nothing to the series. As a film it is a storytelling disaster - literally just two and a half hours of stuff happening.

I've said it elsewhere and I'll say it again, a character like Kreia, and your interactions with her, from KotOR II is how you do a proper subversion of the light/dark philosophy in Star Wars.

the problem when you try to "subvert expectations" is you end up writing to SPITE the story instead of writing to TELL the story. This is literally the first lesson in writing and its disappointing that highly paid professionals cannot grasp this concept

14:11 This is Neo v. Smith at the end of Matrix: Revolutions: when he realizes he has to stop being "the hero" and surrender, he merges with Smith -- literally bonds with his shadow -- and he becomes part of the whole Matrix and 'the code he carries is reinserted into the Matrix thus reestablishing the prime program' (they restore to factory settings) and Smith is gone, and he teaches the Machines and the humans they have to be together in order to survive.

"What's to blame for this re-emergence of evil? Bad writing.

Star Wars - "Mr. Lucas.... I don't feel so good."

Is no one gonna mention Disney execs saying no Rian you can’t have the good guy join the bad guy, that’s too complicated. At least we got knives out, the real Rian Johnson subversion movie

"The greatest teacher failure is" That's the message. Not killing the past. The film says to evolve our systems and ideologies, not to burn them down...

"What's to blame for the resurgence of evil?" (the rise of the First Order).... The corporate decision to just to remake a new empire and rebellion so they could sell Storm Troopers, Tie Fighters, and X Wings in a millennial era reboot. And make them into toys and theme park rides. The existence of The First Order and an under dog rebellion makes ZERO SENSE after the original Trilogy.

I'm so pissed off by The Last Jedi that I've spent more time watching youtube reviews about it than the duration of the movie itself (very good reviews by the way. Thank you guys for bringing justice so cleverly)

"A nearly identical fascistic order... so clearly something is wrong..." Yeah, what's wrong is the film-makers are too uncreative and unimaginative to create a conflict that's not directly copied and pasted over from existing Star Wars films.

So TLJ could have been an absolute genius movie. Too bad it was filled with so much goofy, boring and cheesy shit. What if Ryan Johnson wanted to create a very dark, subversive movie that gave birth to the Gray Jedi Order, completely eliminating the "good guy / bad guy" concept, but Disney didn't let him, and we are stuck blaming the wrong guy for the shit show that was ultimately given to us? 😱

KOTOR II (with extra content mods) did the “nuance in Star Wars” thing 8 billion times better than Rian could ever dream of.

Had Rey actually taken Kylo's hand and then we cut to credits, I think this mess of an interesting but flawed movie would actually have some REAL hype built up for Ep9. But no, gotta get to salt hoth.

This is a really good analysis. Ever since I watched this horrorshow of a movie, all I could tell myself is "you know what? even with all the flaws, this movie could have been salvaged if at that critical moment, Rey joined Kylo". And now you helped me figure out why I felt this way! :) Incredibly accurate.

I am so sick of that stupid word, “subversion.”

*The dark side in the OT:* The quick and easy way to power. *The light side in the OT:* The long, arduous journey, where one must shed their ties to loved ones, and everything else. *Kylo Ren (current dark side):* Trains for decades under two of the most potent teachers in the galaxy, gives up his bonds with his parents in order to become what he perceives to be the strongest version of himself. *Rey (Current light side):* Can do everything she tries better than who we’ve been told are “the most skilled at this thing in the galaxy” on her first try, every time, and literally never trained in any of it.* Why the f*ck do you think Kylo Ren is so many people’s favorite character now? Because we certainly can’t relate to Rey, Rian. We’re not supposed to root against the main god damn character, you and your subversions created the single thing you’re fundamentally not supposed to allow to happen between audiences and a film, to be the only thing that *could* happen between audiences and your film.

This movie attemps to do what Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords did. And at first I thought it was great because of that. But the game did it so much better, even as incomplete as it was on release. I wish the movie stuck to its guns in the third act, because then I wouldn't have slowly come to realise just how disappointing TLJ really is.

Luke being disillusioned was fine, it was just the details leading up to it that were poorly handled. There was no reason to have the atrocious scene of him almost killing Ben Solo, they could have gotten to the same place without it. That really betrayed his character.

"Everything." - Thanos

Though I have my criticisms, I must congratulate you and the Wisecrack team for making the writing seem more intelligent and inspired than it was probably originally intended.

The last half hour of the movie just shows how hypocritical, pointless and without vision the movie truly is. If the filmmakers actually had the balls to tell a controversial, but meaningful story that could stand on its own, I wouldn't be nearly as disappointed. Last year brought us 2 great examples of that, with Logan and Twin Peaks: The Return. But The Last Jedi backpedals on all its supposed themes to the point where they become meaningless and contradictory. It says "let the past die", yet rips off structure and entire scenes from the OT. It promotes heroic sacrifices, only to reject them in the very next scene. It wants to be profound, but is filled with misplaced immature jokes. It plays with lethality of the situations so much that death loses consequence. It teases morally grey character development, until it resets the conflict back into a clear good vs bad division. It tries to seem bold and experimental, but at the end we're back where we started, only with fewer story options for the future and blander characters. The Last Jedi is the definition of insecure edginess. It wants so bad to prove its maturity and artistic legitimacy by ridiculing and destroying the old school aspects of the franchise, but in the end it's just superficial shock value with nothing to say and no imagination of its own, conveniently returning to its predictable safe zone when out of ideas.

I remember seeing this for the first time, disaapointed with what I was watching. Then, the moment Kylo asks Rey to join him, I sat up. "This was where it was all building to!" I was so hyped! But no, she refuses, despite everything in the film saying so far that she should. Instead, the film ends on an overused, childish message of "believe in heroes, protect what you love". Thor Skywalker did a similar video to this, great work Wisecrack!

I can see how subversion would have been awesome here, with the right execution. But there were no stakes - why did it need to be subverted? If Rey had a hero's journey in which she MUST let go of the past to succeed, I might have bought into it. But she doesn't, it's just a "here's how it should be" argument, so there's no need for the subversion in the first place. Subverting just for the sake of subverting it, just for the shits and giggles, is pointless, and alienates the fans. Might make RJ feel all giddy to cause a ruckus, but this show meant more to it's fans than for him to just turn it on it's head because he thought it'd be cool. Sad thing is, I would have bought into a trilogy in which "she's a woman and better at feelings that dry crusty grumpy men in bathrobes". I'd have even accepted a darkside Rey who is fighting for the Rebels. But there's no need for Rey in the plot - how does her presence help them defeat the 1st order? It was Poe who destroyed SK base, after Han + Chewy disabled it. She didn't save Han, didn't save Finn, didn't kill Snoke, didn't turn Kylo, didn't bring Luke back - she's like a pinball bouncing against all the more well-established plot points. I so want her to be awesome, but what has she actually done that significantly moved or turned the plot? Poe, Han + Leia moved the plot in TFA, Luke resisted her efforts to move it in TLJ - it's like Disney forgot how to story. This female force isn't very force, and I'm not going to respect a character just because the studio tells me she's the protagonist. Even Luke had to prove himself.

You don't have to kill the past to make progress.

I wasn't able to finish the film. Also, Rose Tico's decision to block Finn's Heroic Sacrifice at the COST OF EVERYONE ELSE'S LIVES was one of the dumbest things I'd ever seen, especially when it's treated like a victory, and Rose's sister, Paige, who sacrificed herself to take out the Star Destroyer in the beginning, would likely have been insulted by the whole thing.

can we just take a moment and reflect on how Mark Hamill is sitting at 8:24

honestly this was my biggest grief with the movie, even if I couldn't quite put it into words at the time

disney wants to let the past die? "those who don't know their past have no future" r.i.p. star wars

So Ryan Johnson plagiarized the themes of KOTOR II and made a really poor representation of it in a cinema and had the gall to charge entry for it? ok...

This is the smartest and most thoughtful critique of TLJ I've seen. I can't help but wonder how it could have turned out if they just went with the moral framework shift, instead of *cough* subverting *cough* it three quarters of the way in.

One of the most egregious failures to meet its own theme was when Luke said something akin to "The Force is more than just moving rocks" and yet the heroic movement is her using it at that 'base' level in the climax, saving all 10 or so of them, with absolutely no internal struggle to speak of (as she was never at risk of turning, she though she was going to turn Ren).

If The Last Jedi ends with Rey joining Kylo Ren, then there would still be some interest in Episode 9. Once Rey rejected Kylo's offer to join him, everything went back to square one, minus all the interesting elements. Why do we care about Star Wars anymore?

Disney: lets make our own Star Wars -parody before Spaceballs 2 comes out.

"Let it all die" *Cue reference to most famous scene in franchise*

Star Wars: The Last Jedi - What Went Wrong? - Everything !

Everything he did would have been fine, if he didn't shit on every single question that the previous movie posed. Like what was the whole point of episode 7 then

The movie is bad because the entire plot revolves around a convoluted, improbable chase scenario. I don't understand why everyone focuses on various subversions of expectations, aborted plot threads etc. when the core of the movie is so idiotic and ill-fitting to the Star Wars universe. Two ships locked in a chase, keeping the very same distance for days? A sidestory which revolves around an improvised heist, relying on finding a single person a few star systems away, all WHILE THE CHASE IS GOING ON? A plot resolution which introduces a secret "twist" which is... hey, let's all use escape pods and hope the people chasing us all suddenly go blind? Since when is using escape pods "a strategy", and not, I dunno, a default procedure when somebody's shooting your ship to shit??

"For the new Star Wars to live, the old Star Wars must die" The Rise of Skywalker: Oh I don't think so.

Jurassic Park 3, Terminator 3, and The Last Jedi are the 3 movies in my life that I will always remember seeing in theater because I will NEVER forget the feeling of complete and total dread while watching some of my favorite move franchises being ripped apart right in front of me.

So basically, the thing that KOTOR 2 did ages ago and much better.

Rian Johnson didn't want to make a Star Wars movie. Unfortunately, he was making a Star Wars movie.

It just makes me sad really. They could have been so much more. Star Wars has such a rich history, in pop culture and in-universe lore. They made some decent characters, and as seen, have had access to the original cast, so why did they fail so poorly in the the writing. How did the same company that produced Rouge One, a spin-off, get such a poor team for the primary films. It seems the best content since the original trilogy has been the side media: Books, shows, games. At least there's Fallen Order & The Mandalorian for now. I can only hope and assume that side content will continue to persevere with quality.

Just saw this and I 100% agree with this guy, the whole movie is basically projected bad guy, but actually the realist and the one who wants to be a hero, but is actually a hypocrite in a way.

"What went wrong?" *TLJ begins at the EXACT moment TFA ended* *first words of opening crawl* "The First Order Reigns" I knew from those first words of the opening crawl that something was wrong. Reigns?! How?! Sure, the First Order was a significant threat but they got pretty fucked up with Starkiller base being destroyed (which appeared to be their main headquarters)! How have the other systems not rallied against them by now.

It's kind of interesting how many Ideas were brought up in the film. But none of them work, because Rian wasn't interested in telling a story.

Thank u for your break down of the movie!!! Makes me want to watch again:)

"her swol new crush" me: LMFAOOL

Actually, Jung did not argue for the coexistence of the Shadow and the Ego. He argued that the Shadow must be made conscious so that it can be dissolved under the light of awareness. So the goal is not to learn to live with the Shadow - although that helps, because it stops you from projecting it onto others - but to get rid of and become, indeed, a heroic being, like the Jedi, and like Luke was at the end of ROTJ. I wonder if one reason Rian Johnson stumbled is because he didn't figure out, or Disney has not figured out, where they are going with the metaphysics of Star Wars. I love The Force Awakens, but JJ could have taken Star Wars in any direction he wanted, and he went with a replica of the previous conflict, which is a tough starting point for anyone looking to do something different (but not so different as to alienate the old fanbase).

Interesting themes, terrible execution. Trust me, I know all about terrible execution.

3:13 Slovenian philosopher.. 😅 took a while to remember, but.. Slavoj Zizek! 😄

December 2019 and I still can't get over how bad it was.

You seem to have completely missed the point of the OT. Luke already WAS the future, he already WAS the change the galaxy and the Jedi Order needed. He was only able to succeed were the old Jedi Order failed precisely because he was something new and different to what had come before. He was literally A NEW HOPE. Obi-Wan and Yodi spent the entire OT telling Luke that he couldn't save Vader and the only option was to kill him. Luke subverted and proved them wrong by doing the exact opposite. The PT only served to further show us how different Luke was to the old Jedi. That's part of the problem with TLJ and blind fanboy defenses of how "too ballsy" it was like this video. It completely disregards what happened in the OT and the PT or twists them to fit the story they want to tell.

For not being interested in repeating what came before, Rian sure did repeat a lot of what came before.

The Star Wars universe was created around a certain idea about good and evil: good and evil are entirely separate, but that doesn't mean that people are 100% good or 100% evil: the whole trilogy turns on Luke finding the good in Darth Vader. It makes no sense to use that universe to illustrate a competing idea about good and evil: you have to twist everything out of shape: the force, the Jedi, the politics, everything. That's why Johnson's idea never could have worked.

Your analysis makes the movie better. Can't ask for much more than that.

The idea that the light and dark exist in everyone was already at the heart of the OT. The Empire Strikes Back: Luke: "What's in there?" Yoda: "Only what you take with you." It's in there. It's subtle, but it's there. Vader still has light in him and can be turned because no one is pure good or pure evil. The problem is that Rian Johnson doesn't seem to understand anything that isn't explicitly spelled out in dialogue. We win by saving what we love? That was the core of Luke's character in the OT. But thanks for hitting us over the head with it, Rose. Great force users can come from nothing? That was Anakin, the son of a slave. Don't preach at me, tell me a good story with the proper elements and character growth, and I will get the message.

My problem with The Last Jedi is that it goes out of it's way to subvert tropes solely for the sake of subverting them. Subverting a trope only works if the subversion is more entertaining or interesting than the trope it's subverting. To give an example: Imagine you're a kid in the month of December. The entire month your parents have been at you getting something really amazing for Christmas and you're really hyped for it. So the morning of Christmas you open your gifts and it's just socks and underwear. In this scenario, your expectations have definitely been subverted but you're still left with something more mundane and boring than what you originally expected. And that's the problem with this movie. Snoke being killed off with no backstory subverted my expectations but it's still boring and poor writing in my opinion. Rey's parents turning out to be a bunch of hicks who abandoned her is far less interesting than finding out she's related to a previously established Jedi (or any force user). Subverting an expectation with a more mundane answer typically only works when it's being played for laughs. If it's meant to be taken seriously then it just comes off as mundane.

"Slovenian philosopher." I see the resemblance to Zizek now. _How do I hit undo?_

This video is perfection!

It needed more Jar Jar

Rob Schneider is, “The Last Jedi” -Rated Derp Derpa Derp

1. Jung can himself be wrong or 'not applicable'. 2. Cynicism (that is advanced according to you in the first part of the film) was a philosophical idea that fall out of fashion about 2300 years ago. For obvious reasons. 3. Changing a point of reference will not change the process, that is nullifying the idea that there exists Evil does not lead to automatic reduction of suffering, for example saying the slavery is neither good or bad won't automaticaly remove slavery or make slaves suffering less. The film does not go 'wrong' just by being in opposition to the ideas of cynicism.

11:33 Me when my dad says that he was coming home 7 years ago and still hasn't come back

I think it was an utterly pointless star wars movie. It is as you said, it spent the entire movie trying to subvert the tropes of good and evil in star wars, just to lazily revert back to them in the end. What a disappointing movie.

Rian's next set of movies: Episode 9: The Force Examines itself. Episode: 10: The Force Goes to Therapy, Episode 11: The Force Tries Reiki, Episode 12: The Force has a Mid-Life Crisis.

Can't wait for the next video about what went wrong with TROS.

I love the idea of reframing in Star Wars. The problem here was the sloppy execution, all the way up to Luke having a force projection heart attack at the end.

The elephant in the room that you’re missing is that Rian took it upon himself to present a solution where there was no problem. Star Wars was so beloved because the characters were beloved. To come in with a baseball bat and smash it all because you don’t like it is stupid. I have no problem with introducing a whole new paradigm, but to do it by betraying Luke’s character is self-indulgent and completely out of touch. I don’t have time to propose all the possible ways I could think of to pull off the paradigm shift without performing a script jihad, but suffice it to say, I’m sure it’s in the hundreds. This idiot, Rian, and KK have betrayed the fan base. Now they reap the consequences of the backlash. So be it

Shoving contrived plot twists down our throats that don't work isn't a good thing. Shocker, I know.

Disney :"Let the past die!" Immanuel Kant: "Stories/Reality is ultimately unknowable why even try, let it die..." This mirrors the toxic zeitgeist we live in, trash the good and elevate the insane and destructive.

This is actually the only good criticism I've seen of the movie no talking about bombers and lightsaber choreography and not talking about lukes "ruined character"

Rian Johnson wanted to subvert expectations, except he subverted literally every expectation and I felt like he was trolling us.

Black and white melt into grey Till every truth is stripped away When nothing's wrong nothing's ok Everyone has been betrayed

Thank you for this.

Dave Filloni is the one apparently who is with the whole “The Force balances itself” narrative. Freddie Prinze Jr. said it in that video he posted

Star Wars: The Last Jedi - What Went Wrong? Beats me: the 2016 Ghostbusters did SO well with the same formula of flipping off the audience.

In conclusion, they should’ve just did the Thrawn trilogy.

Never saw it like that damn, you present some seriously good stuff.

"We're going to try something different so we're literally going to do the opposite of what made fans love this franchise" Then y make a fucking star wars movie!!!!!!

Simple answer; If you wanna make something new, just make something NEW. Why take an old IP and crap all over it. Oh yeah cause merchandising and it's easier to push the Star Wars name instead of creating a new franchise.

The philosophy of why Luke Skywalker likes drinking space moose milk.

Wow So mega well done Nice wisecrack

I liked it. Love to see more.

The main problem as far as I see it: Star Wars is a capital 'S' Saga. A tale of heroes. Other characters gain importance in the Saga by their proximity to the heroes central to it. The new philosophy enforced by the makers of TLJ, 'our conception of classical heroes must be subverted and overcome, for there are no real classical heroes', goes contra to the very fabric of the structure of the previous 7 films as well as rogue one and the various animated features. Thus it fails at being Star Wars. If I crave a steak, I do not care how masterful the pasta dish is supposed to be you are serving me instead. It isn't steak and your pasta is under-cooked.

1. I left a quiet theater walking down a hallway feeling bad and it was silent in the crowd. No cheers, no wow, no that was fun, it was a funeral. 2. A good essay premise with more thought than the director put into it. 3. If I pay that much money and have a bad time it is not a good movie. 4. I could believe the movie was a dream and the Dallas character was in the shower better than I could believe some of the writing in this movie. 5. The best parts for me was any time Yoda was on screen and the Jedi master acted like the student again and it was good, when he kissed his sister on the forehead, and when Luke was willing do help people he cared about. 6. Having an optimistic character who believed even Darth Vader could be redeemed suddenly be willing to murder a nephew over what HE MIGHT do is not Luke Skywalker. I could even explain it in Star Trek terms by saving it makes more sense that this is the Mirror Mirror universe of Star Wars and that is not our Luke Skywalker. 7. I left Incredibles 2 laughing and hoping for a sequel 3, and part of me kind of dreads what they will do next for Star Wars after setting up all kinds of questions and tossing them away as unimportant while focusing on side plots that were not engaging. 8. You don't kill Admiral Akbar off camera. 9. You don't use ships as kamikaze faster than light missiles or the entire chase sequence is useless and tactics in combat would have already emerged differently long ago like detachable warhead warp pylons that could be guided. It was a macguffin. 10. Bad writing is when you have plots develop that require the characters to do dumb things. Example have the Rebel force simply explain the plan she had and entire subplots become moot once her officers understood. As far as I was concerned the movie stumbled everytime it focused on something other than Luke, Yoda, and Leia and I endured the side plots to sell merchandising critter dolls to get back to the main plot line. 11. I do not envy anyone having the burden of fixing all this in the next movie and have the fans care. The Rebel movie was superior. The Solo movie was the result of too many cooks in the kitchen and was not as fun as it could have been. Ending rebel with the moments just before the first movie really worked. This movie got lost trying to push its points without having respect for the characters. If you do not respect beloved characters then you do not respect the fans. It was not Jungian, it was bad writing and directing in the end. There is a difference between good and evil in a person. A hero overcomes and grows, nurtures and seeks to do the right thing while evil only harms, destroys, corrupts, and hurts innocents. There is a real difference and any human is capable of good and evil but can with great effort overcome evil to choose to be good and do good which is a heroic choice. I think the Force could be just an energy and whether good or evil is moot in the physics of the Force, but becomes good or evil by the choices characters make. Aggressive moves in the defense of others is not sith and passivity in the face of evil is not jedi. A good jedi should be like Bruce Lee in a fight being like water but not losing sight of trying to do the right thing no matter the odds and sometimes that takes patience. Keeping your head while all about you are losing their minds is strength not weakness. The real Luke seeing an effect on a young nephew would have been to seek to shield and confront the evil attacking his nephew to protect. This Luke was the Mirror Mirror universe Luke due to bad writing, not understanding the character, and wanting to make points more than being true to the characters that made them beloved to fans in the first place. Or worse understanding the character and not caring about the foundational part that caused fans to care about the character and only about pushing points of view for the sake of the point of view being more important. If you complain as a writer about hubris you are defining hubris in your own script. You might as well be looking in a mirror while writing that line. That was not Luke so much as a surrogate for Kathleen Kennedy and Rian's world viewpoint. That works in a Hitchcock movie where the director is a character in the film in effect. It did not work in this movie. I will not even buy the DVD. It was an aberration. Marvel is successful because they plan out entire plotlines over movies and directors follow those guidelines. If there was no coherent vision for all three movies when the way has been shown then it could be it is more on Kathleen Kennedy than one director, but it is a failure in my mind.

"...slash Slovenian philosopher" I died. Lol

How does this video not have way more views. Every film school add it to their curriculum.