Neil Calloway tries to find middle ground with the latest Star Wars film…
Warning: contains spoilers for Star Wars: The Last Jedi.
It’s been over a week, you’ve had time to go through the stages of grief and finally come to acceptance that The Last Jedi is a fairly decent film, or if you won’t accept that, you can accept that there’s nothing you can do about it. That petition won’t work. It’s here to stay, and Rian Johnson is making his own Star Wars trilogy. You overreacting like a spoiled schoolkid – or a whiny New Hope era Luke Skywalker – is not going to change anything. The Simpsons’ Comic Book Guy is not a person you should look up to as a role model. “Worst. Episode. Ever.” is not a good mantra. You can’t wallow in a bath of distilled essence of Jawa and Greedo forever.
For the record, I liked The Last Jedi, but didn’t love it. It was overlong, too slow placed, I could have done without Leia flying through space like she’s from Krypton, Benicio Del Toro’s character could have been better developed – if we don’t see more of him I’ll be disappointed, and Captain Phasma remains one of the most underwhelming and overhyped characters in film history.
Having said that, I was glad Supreme Leader Snoke was done away with, if only because he served no real purpose, and the speculation that he was really Palpatine or some obscure character from an Expanded Universe novel nobody has read was annoying me, and a Star Wars movie that featured Adrian Edmondson is always going to be worth a watch – though the fact that he didn’t hit anybody over the head with a frying pan was a disappointment. Kelly Marie Tran is superb, and her character is a welcome addition, though her story about living under the Empire is a bit too close to the “when the infidels came to my village…” speech from Team America: World Police. The humour took a bit of getting used to, but was an enjoyable part of the film for me.
If you are genuinely disappointed by The Last Jedi, then let me introduce you to a film called The Phantom Menace. An unnecessary detour to Canto Bight looks like a work of staggering genius when seen alongside Midichlorians, Trade Federations and Gungans. The Force Awakens was a nostalgiafest, it was time for something different. Frankly, I’m excited for the next film, purely because I want to see what happens when the entire resistance can fit in the Millennium Falcon.
Mark Hamill has been vocal in saying that he would not have taken Luke in the direction that the film does, but there’s a reason he didn’t direct it and Rian Johnson did, and Hamill is decent enough to say “it’s only a movie. I hope people like it. I hope they don’t get upset, and I came to really believe that Rian was the exact man that they needed for this job.” Fans who are throwing their Boba Fett figures out of the pram because they didn’t like the film should remember that.
Neil Calloway is a pub quiz extraordinaire and Top Gun obsessive. Check back here every Sunday for future instalments.
Originally published December 24, 2017. Updated April 19, 2018.
