Is Last Jedi Luke's actions consistent with Luke's character from the original movies?

[AuRon]

Alright there's a lot to unpack there AuRon, so I apologize if I miss responding to anything.

You not buying Luke Skywalker in TLJ I get. My primary issue wasn't that you find The Last Jedi's characters unbelievable or unlikable, but that you are accusing the movie as a whole of being cynical. Let me try to go through the reasons you stated:

1. Luke's fall in TLJ means heroes don't exist and nothing matters

Its not just about Luke. Its other things too. DJ betraying them. I know they only just met him, but they were still counting on him, and the movie spent a lot of time building up to them getting help from a codebreaker on that planet. In fact, that whole subplot kind of felt like a waste of time.

Poe being ineffective for most of the movie. The resistance being reduced to a tiny number of people. The Force Awakens also made a huge deal of finding Luke Skywalker, and how getting to him was SO important. This was a big part of TFA, and a large part of Rey's mission. Then at the end, she finds him, and there's this big scene with swelling music where she presents the lightsbaer to him. A lot of people loved this moment, and it made them excited to see the next movie, even if they weren't crazy about TFA in general. So what does TLJ do? Start with Luke immediately tossing the lightsaber (his lightsaber from the old movies) away casually, and telling Rey he won't help her. Is this not cynical? If you go back and watch TFA and get to that scene, is it still going to have the same impact now, knowing what TLJ does to follow up on it?

You keep saying Luke saved the day at the end. Yeah, but that still doesn't change him abandoning his friends for so many years, and not helping all that time they needed him. He had an 11th hour change of heart. Great. Even that was dependent on a contrivance though, since without those snow wolves (or whatever) the people in the cave wouldn't have been able to escape anyway.

For me, the most cynical thing about The Last Jedi is the fact that it was largely built on doing the opposite of what people wanted or expected. It was more concerned with subverting expectations than with telling a good story. I already mentioned the lightsaber. But many things were just what old movies had done, but with a "subverted" outcome. In Empire, Luke goes to a planet with R2-D2 to receive training from an old jedi master, and eventually receives it. In TLJ Rey goes to a planet with R2-D2 to receive training from an old jedi master, and essentially is taught nothing. Luke went into a cave to find something, which resulted in important information. Rey went into a cave to find something, and found nothing of consequence. The movie even steals from ROTJ, with the throne room scene. Palpatine had Luke at his mercy, but Vader betrays and kills the emperor to save Luke. Similarly, Snoke has Rey at his mercy, but Kylo betrays and kills him to save her. But then the twist outcome, where it turns out Kylo wasn't redeemed, but just wanted to kill Snoke so he could become the top bad guy. Oh, and they also throw in the "join me and together we'll rule" scene from Empire, except with yet another subverted outcome: In empire Luke learned important information about his family, i.e. his father is Darth Vader. Which changed everything for him. In TLJ, Rey learns that her parents were nobody, which changes nothing. Good job Rian.

And that's the biggest problem: This movie is just built on subversions, and redoing stuff from earlier movies but with "unexpected" outcomes. That isn't deep. Its actually kind of shallow once you realize what they're doing, and why its happening. Yes, TLJ does have some moments of hope and optimism, but in many ways this is still a very cynical movie.

I mostly just intended to talk about Luke, but somehow this moved into the movie in general. As far as the text, I'll just say that I don't think it was a well written movie, and I suspect that even Mr. Johnson wasn't sure what he was trying to say specifically. He just knew that he wanted to subvert expectations. I suspect that even Luke getting involved in the final battle only happened because it was the opposite of what Yoda did in Empire, i.e. Yoda just stayed on the planet and didn't get involved in rescuing Luke's friends.

[Yukaphile]

Hey, AuRon, tbf, it was the second sequel in... the sequel trilogy. It had to pull a big "Empire Strikes Back" type subversion somehow. Because what were they supposed to do? Be original? Pfffft, dream on!

[Yukaphile]

Some people have fallaciously compared this to KOTOR 2. I find that insulting. KOTOR 2 is a damn fine game despite being rushed to meet a deadline, with depth and complexity even in a character that most people tend to love or hate, with very true commentary on humanity, on the nature of the cosmos that far transcends the Force itself. Last Jedi? Is just shallow, no substance. Mark Hamill said it best when he compared these new films to Bayformers. It's all Hollywood knows how to make.

[BridgeConsoleMasher]

I never got the impression that Luke defied the Jedi order or anything in the original trilogy. He was a relatable protagonist that surely had an arc, but Obi's warning that Vader was more machine than man doesn't say anything to the Jedi order. It doesn't turn things inside out when Luke gets to Anakin, it's just a personal growth for both of them.

[AuRon]

You know what? I'm just going to post a conversation that Lucas had many years ago. SFDebris actually used at least part of this in one of his Star Wars videos. Maybe this will clarify why some fans of the original movies don't like the directions The Last Jedi (and the disney stuff in general) went. Not saying I agree with all of it, but its something to think about. Here it is:

Kasdan: I think you should kill Luke and have Leia take over.
Lucas: You don’t want to kill Luke.
Kasdan: Okay, then kill Yoda.
Lucas: I don’t want to kill Yoda. You don’t have to kill people. You’re a product of the 1980s. You don’t go around killing people. It’s not nice.
Kasdan: No, I’m not. I’m trying to give the story some kind of an edge to it.
Lucas: I know you’re trying to make it more realistic, which is what I tried to do when I killed Ben—but I managed to take the edge off of it—and it’s what I tried to do when I froze Han. But this is the end of the trilogy and we’ve already established that there are real dangers. I don’t think we have to kill anyone to prove it.
Kasdan: No one has been hurt.
Lucas: Ben and Han, they’ve both—Luke got his hand cut off.
Kasdan: Ben and Han are fine. Luke got a new hand two cuts later.
Lucas: By killing somebody, I think you alienate the audience.
Kasdan: I’m saying that the movie has more emotional weight if someone you love is lost along the way; the journey has more impact.
Lucas: I don’t like that and I don’t believe that.
Kasdan: Well, that’s all right.
Lucas: I have always hated that in movies, when you go along and one of the main characters gets killed. This is a fairytale. You want everybody to live happily ever after and nothing bad happens to anybody.
Kasdan: I hate it when characters get killed, too.
Lucas: Oh, you do.
Kasdan: I do.
Lucas: I resent it and I resented it when I was a little kid. I would watch and there would be these five guys and one of them would be the funny clown and halfway through, one of them gets killed. Why did they kill the lead? He was the best character.
Marquand: I felt that about Ben the first time I saw Star Wars.
Kasdan: But that one worked like crazy.
Lucas: Yes, I know. But we’ve done that. The same thing with Han. The biggest reaction we got was when people asked, “How can you leave the movie half finished?” Well, the main thrust of this one is that it has to be fun.
Kasdan: All of our material here is not fun.
Lucas: Well, I know we’ve got the serious side.
Kasdan: We have a lot of grim stuff here.
Lucas: Well, that’s why we have to concentrate on the fun.
Kasdan: There isn’t much fun stuff. There is the Jabba stuff.
Lucas: That’s fun.
Kasdan: And the Ewok stuff and that’s it.
Lucas: There are three parts to the movie: Jabba, the Ewoks, and Luke and the Emperor. Luke and the Emperor are not fun and the other two are. I think that we can roll along with the fun parts and still have this undercurrent of a fairly serious study of father and son, and good and evil. The whole concept of the original film is that Luke redeems his father, which is the classic fairytale: a good father/bad father who the good son will turn back into the good father. We can have a serious line and still have a fairly light film.
The whole point of the film, the whole emotion that I am trying to get at the end of this film, is for you to be real uplifted, emotionally and spiritually, and feel absolutely good about life. That is the greatest thing that we could possibly ever do.

REVENGE OF THE JEDI STORY CONFERENCE TRANSCRIPT, JULY 13 TO JULY 17, 1981 from The Making of Return of the Jedi book by J.W. Rinzler.

[BridgeConsoleMasher]

Did you actually write that teleplay?

[AuRon]

Did you actually write that teleplay?

If you're talking to me, no. I copied and pasted this. Sources: https://www.reddit.com/r/StarWars/comme ... iscussion/

http://norewardisworththis.tumblr.com/p ... -have-leia

The original text the discussion is taken from is also listed at the bottom. And, like I said, SFDebris also quoted parts of this transcript in one of his videos (The Return of the Jedi review?) I just thought it would be interesting to look at this to put some things into perspective.

[BridgeConsoleMasher]

Did you actually write that teleplay?

If you're talking to me, no. I copied and pasted this. Sources: https://www.reddit.com/r/StarWars/comme ... iscussion/

http://norewardisworththis.tumblr.com/p ... -have-leia

The original text the discussion is taken from is also listed at the bottom. And, like I said, SFDebris also quoted parts of this transcript in one of his videos (The Return of the Jedi review?) I just thought it would be interesting to look at this to put some things into perspective.

Well okay. But I don't think that's necessarily admissible for judgement of the content put to screen.

[AllanO]

You know what? I'm just going to post a conversation that Lucas had many years ago. SFDebris actually used at least part of this in one of his Star Wars videos. Maybe this will clarify why some fans of the original movies don't like the directions The Last Jedi (and the disney stuff in general) went. Not saying I agree with all of it, but its something to think about. Here it is:

The thing I note is that while Lucas says he does not want to kill Yoda, Yoda does end up dying in ROTJ (it is unclear to me whether killing meant a violent death or any death), I would suggest that illustrates nicely that simply because characters die (or even are killed) does not make it some gratuitous exercise in grim-dark. I don't think say Luke's death in TLJ is particularly grim or the like (very much like Yoda's death) and more broadly I don't think the story of TLJ somehow renders meaningless or otherwise negates the victories of the original trilogy.

Anyway in terms of your broader point, I think mere defying expectations when it is shallow and gimicky is kind of hack, lazy and/or cynical writing. However I think those of us who think TLJ worked think it does much more than defy expectations, rather it sets up one thing and than another thing happens that second thing actually makes way more sense than the initial expectation. So Luke says he's not going to go it alone against the first order with a laser sword and in the end he does exactly that but not exactly, and to me it works great because the subversion (it is an illusion) makes more sense then the initial expectation. Of course finding that more satisfying depends on lots of judgments along the way that one might disagree with.

Just to pick up on one thing you mentioned to you it seemed like the Resistance is saved by a lucky chance, the cats showing the back way out of the cave, I get the impression that Luke's effort is predicated on some awareness of just that possibility. The force is giving him not just the power to project himself across the galaxy but the awareness to push at just the right point to make the difference and save the day (give the resistance the chance to use the back door), somewhat like how he makes the critical shot that blows up the Death Star in the original movie, the fact that the Death Star has this one tiny weakness is (at least from the point of view of Luke etc.) a coincidence but the force lets him exploit it. Indeed even getting to that point required a string of concidences and contrivances, lucky those lazy Imperial troops did not blow up C3PO and R2's escape pod at the beginning of the movie otherwise the entire original trilogy would not have happened and so on (some of this is about the contrived nature of fiction).

If someone's judgment balks at the contrivance of the Imperials not blowing up that escape pod, I am not sure I have a better ultimate defense of it then I am just satisfied with that contrivance even if they are not. Likewise I find Luke's rescue of the Resistance a masterstroke, others may find it a lucky fumble. Ultimately some of this just depends on judgment, taste and other subjective considerations.

Anyway to the question of the thread put me down as among those who had a conception of Luke based on the way I watched the original trilogy and this movie, where the two lined up pretty well. However just what Luke was like in the original trilogy and just what he is supposed to have done in TLJ seems like debated points.

[BridgeConsoleMasher]

Anyway to the question of the thread put me down as among those who had a conception of Luke based on the way I watched the original trilogy and this movie, where the two lined up pretty well. However just what Luke was like in the original trilogy and just what he is supposed to have done in TLJ seems like debated points.

But this serves to asks of Rian or whoever wrote its competency in writing Luke Skywalker. If there is any case that Luke's actions are consistent then that determines the competency.