Star Wars VII VIII IX

Review of IV V VI, Jan 2017


The Force Awakens - 5/10/20

Two people watched movies in adjacent rooms. One watched The Force Awakens, the other watched Parasite. They ended almost exactly the same moment. One emerged like a tree after a tsunami. The other emerged like one who's been chewing a lot of bubble gum, though he was hungry. One was crippled and dripping, a cup spilling, overfull; the other still bounced in his seat for something that never came.

Though I kind of liked it, The Force Awakens was lame. Maybe I'm just not a Star Wars fanatic, but maybe it's not my style. It all seems so trite. How could it provide rich experience to anyone but juveniles and fanatics, being so obvious and vacuous like a light show? I really expected more -- depth, weight, darkness, awe, intrigue, beauty. Was I hoping JJ Abrams would do for Star Wars what Christopher Nolan did for Batman, Martin Campbell for James Bond? Not entirely, but I figured decades removed from the original three would naturally pull the franchise into 21st c. epic gravitas (notwithstanding cheap 21st c. humor alongside, which I expected). But I didn't realize: this is for adolescents and fanatics. It's a good transition for kids into adult movies; and fans savor it regardless, like I would anything Tolkien-related, no matter the quality. Outside these two perspectives, the movie is vapid. Rest assured all tropes are rehashed. The only refreshment is its socially progressive agenda, especially regarding female roles: it may not be very progressive, but at least it's intentional, and anyway all I'm saying is this is refreshing relative to the older ones. At least they got mindful about something, while most else is stupidly obvious. I still like it fine, but I expected more intellect and inspiration. Actually, see Lion King 2019 post.

So there are several ways I can appreciate and respect this movie as a cultural entity, but hardly as a movie in itself. It lacks the beauty and intelligence I seek in all movies, in all things. If it fails to provide beautiful or interesting experience, what more can I say?

I did enjoy it. I wasn't bored. I might even follow up with 8 and 9. But my expectations were high, and it was relatively lame.


The Last Jedi - 5/11/20

Most striking writing moment for me: Luke says reach out; Rey reaches her hand out; Luke says "Reach out with your feelings." This reminded me of Jane Eyre "Am I a machine without feelings?" However, that instance is far more forgivable, being many years before "feelings" became the weakest word to describe any condition of the human soul. I want the Force to be profound. If the Force isn't profound, nothing in Star Wars is profound. And you're telling me the Force resides in your "feelings"? Maybe it does, but was this written by a child? Or are we offending children by assuming they'll only understand this language? Children might have written much of this movie, actually. But if we're writing for children, we can challenge and respect them much better (I keep forcing myself not to mention Tolkien, again and again). And if the Force isn't profound, then stop writing "hell" into the script, because this movie is only for kids. Again, see Lion King 2019 post.

Speaking of profound, I think my favorite element in all of Star Wars is its flirting with divinity. This occurs across several characters and concepts. Nearly all characters are consistently shallow to me except in moments they look almost like deities. I only realized this during The Last Jedi, with its focus on Luke and the developing histories of Kylo and Rey. My most beautiful and profound moments in Star Wars seem almost always to be during confrontation with nebulous divinity, transcendent power suddenly unleashed. This says something broader about myself. It's why Gandalf is one of my favorite characters in all of fiction. His sudden outbursts of power and beauty and depth stun me. Maybe it's the rare humbling of my excessive ego I crave -- it strikes me still with an awe I rarely experience. It humiliates my normally-unappeasable standards for beauty and intelligence, those pillars of experience I mentioned earlier. Maybe the divine is fascinating and beautiful to me, to paralyze my wits and my senses like so little can. Gandalf is the perfect antidote. Even Aragorn shows sporadic outbursts of that Firstborn blood. I understand everyone loves when Luke is shot a thousand times and stands unharmed. But I think it strikes me in a particular way I'm rarely struck. It excites my emotions and veneration, it lights my eyes, like nothing else in Star Wars has been. The same vein is Rey and Kylo turning back to back and fighting the mob with simultaneous strength and elegance, supernaturally endowed. Or when Rey lifts the rocks at the end. I know everyone likes this. But it stands far apart from the rest of the movies for me. I wish Star Wars took itself even more seriously. Sometimes it's very serious, sometimes melodramatically serious, but ultimately the most profound elements are underplayed. I remember years ago I was disappointed with the character arc in Under the Skin. Bill asked "what do you want, just two hours of Scarlett Johansson luring men into the abyss?" Affirmative. I want to feel awe. I don't want to comprehend everything. Comprehension has stolen emotion away from my life. Every game I play is intelligible. I want to see things with natures unfathomably deep. This is what inspires me: gods, with power and intelligence I can't touch. It's what's beautiful to me. This may be all that redeems Star Wars -- its trace of the divine, coursing through numerous entities. It's rarely indulged to my satisfaction. Yes, I just want to sit back and watch the power unleashed continuously. Star Wars tarries in such shallow water 95% of the time. I said the same thing in my reviews of the original three. In fact I may have formulated much of this in different words there -- I don't remember. The mechanics and dynamics of the divine are what make Star Wars interesting and beautiful, when it is.

I still enjoyed the movie, and I especially appreciated awe-inspiring demigod expressions. I'll watch the last, mostly to see how these demigods evolve. I certainly don't care at all about the Resistance winning the galaxy, nor Finn's story. Of many subplots, I care almost universally little, but the sweeping evolution of the semi-divine and the rocking balance of the universe keep me interested. In Tolkien, especially the books, the whole vision for a world is planted in each particular, so that everything has depth and meaning. A major difference is this: Tolkien was crafting his world for solitary decades, with no end besides artistic expression, and while studying and teaching completely different things. He needed to express his vision, and therefore did so with unparalleled authenticity. For these filmmakers, box office billions were guaranteed. Maybe they love their subject and product ecstatically. But they only put a small fraction of the soul Tolkien put into his work into theirs. Maybe it's not their fault. The production companies needed very specific things from these movies. The filmmakers mostly just needed to show up. And maybe that's all they did. Anyway, capitalism set a thousand parameters on these movies. They needed to be something specific, and were created for it, while Tolkien's work simply needed to be created.


The Rise of Skywalker - 5/13/20

Now I am happy. The Rise of Skywalker struck deepest. It's obviously not all I want it to be, but three movies in, I can adopt the rhythm and tone, fall in with the characters, and of course, finales are often most profound. My most emotional couple of moments occurred in this movie. My greatest triumphs, fears, and surprises occurred here. Despite relentless jokes, this one was bleakest. It also confronted high concepts clearest. Perhaps its most exquisite virtue, up against the other two, is that it surprised me a few important times. The writing isn't all bad, if it can surprise me and still make sense.

As before, nothing in these movies can touch the concepts of Jedi, Sith, and Force for me. The powerful incomprehensible is more beautiful to me than anything else here -- far more beautiful than almost everything human happening in these movies. The human aspect is always way too archetypal, such that it doesn't impact me. Only parent/child relationships, perhaps, enriched these movies for me, since that topic is poignant for me right now. Bloodlines, natures, "dynastic imperatives." Obviously Star Wars is significantly involved in these concepts, which I appreciate. Besides that, I cared little about most human meddling here, but was invested in the divine dynamics. Of course I care about humans, but not human figures cut from paper. But my investment in the Jedi, Sith, and Force only ramped up over time, such that by the crucial confrontation (all-Sith meets all-Jedi) my eyes went wide and my heart fluttered. I have to say my sinuses moistened. Rey is a small frame and a sprightly visage to represent all Jedi ever! It's challenging and beautiful to comprehend her significance on sight, like the infant Christ. Whether Rey is written consistently profound is interesting. I'm always surprised when profundity descends. I guess that's significant about Christ's figure in literature -- he's never not profound. But in almost all cases, profundity descends, or appears to. Gandalf selectively reveals his power. Nordic Choir singers are usually ditzy. Bob Dylan eats breakfast. It blows my mind, really. Rey is profound, powerful, and beautiful. This is why I watch Star Wars. It's trite to emphasize repeatedly how much I enjoy the expressions of power. But I'm not in love with this -- it's simply by far the thing I most want to talk about, regarding these movies. I like some of the human stuff -- I like Finn and Poe and the fighter pilots and some of the relationships -- but I'll forget them fast. What I'm going to remember, doubtless, and yearn to see again, are expressions of power from Rey, Kylo, Luke. The moments they rose above everyone else, fought everyone else's fight, bore the whole world's bane.

This brings me directly into my next topic, which distracted me throughout this last film. I regret disrespecting this film by repeatedly thinking and speaking of another, rather than experiencing it in itself, but the parallels were unmistakable. The Rise of Skywalker was nearly directly influenced by Tolkien's War of the Ring, there can be no question. The filmmakers may have watched The Return of the King for inspiration on closing a trilogy. Since this blog is primarily for myself, not readers, I rarely burden myself to provide examples, but I think they're clear, and I'll just mention: they even said "dark throne"! Tolkien's war and world are far more profound to me, but it's no coincidence this film affected me significantly more than the other two. It shared some arcs with Tolkien.

I enjoyed it all, and even got a little emotional near the end. The supernatural dynamics held my interest when nothing else did. I'm a sucker for power and profundity, which turns to beauty in my perception. These things were present enough. Most of the action was really cheap, but sometimes sufficiently tense. Most of the dialogue was childish, but I didn't care too much. I mostly ignored that. I needed rich conceptual backdrop, and Star Wars has always had just enough of that, perhaps in spite of the writers, to hold me here. I certainly don't love it. But I like it, and I almost love Rey. I wanted an even more epic conclusion. One thing I should mention that I seriously appreciate about these three movies, besides the supernatural and the "dynastic imperative" thing, is their respect for the past. As the dynastic imperative thing strikes me personally, and timely, so does indulgence in the past, and these three movies are gluttons. I should have mentioned this earlier, but I remember it now: I would have liked these significantly less without such retrospection. Some would cheaply call it nostalgic, some excessively so, but I find reflection on the past to be beautiful, emotional, and of ultimate necessity. The new three Star Wars indulged me plenty.

I liked it all, I didn't love it, and it was exceedingly lame much of the time. But I like it.


A few days later

I do miss Star Wars already. It's rare I indulge in such escapism, and immersive media in general, which certainly intensifies my pining. But as expected, what am I thinking about? -- just those glorious semi-divine moments. Finn definitely ended up not mattering much, relative to his heroic entrance in The Force Awakens. I guess the writers realized he was peripheral halfway through. His role was primarily straight-man, in a couple senses. I eventually became tense about the galaxy's political battle, just like the strife in The Return of the King. In both cases the bleak odds become devastating, before they are wiped by one supernatural event perpetrated by a small hero bearing the entire bane and burden. Despite all my stoic criticism in this post, I actually became devastated by the odds near the end. It was terribly sad, like fighting before the Black Gate, or at Pelennor, or before the Elves arrive at Helm's Deep. It's crushing. I guess the late arrival of the galactic allies in Star Wars is very analogous to the arrivals of Rohan and the Undead at Pelennor, or maybe the Elves at Helm's Deep, while still the war is never won without our small supernatural hero. But in this sense, I was eventually affected by the human element. Only at the very end, in the devastating situation at Exegol, but I was eventually affected. However, like I was saying, as expected, I miss none of this -- I only miss Rey and Kylo. I only miss the gods. Everything else is forgettable, but I long to see Rey again, I long to see Kylo. As The Lord of the Rings is not about The Lord of the Rings in itself, only in its historical context, nor about any of the company or races involved, but in itself actually largely just the story of a hobbit, that is, in itself, not in its historical context; so these three Star Wars are in themselves not really about the Star Wars, nor the Sith, but are the story of a Jedi. In the greater Tolkien context, The Lord of the Rings is about ending The Lord of the Rings, precipitating the exodus of the Firstborn, and ushering the age of Men we live in today. But to read the books is to experience something completely different -- the story of a hobbit. Obviously The Hobbit does that identically, though its analogy to Star Wars is weaker given its limited historical importance. The Lord of the Rings is of profound importance, so as to define an Age, but still largely feels like the story of a hobbit. These three Star Wars movies are historically important to their world, but feel like the story of a Jedi. My point is, I care far more about the Jedi, singular and plural, than the rest. I already miss these movies, but what do I miss? -- just Rey, Kylo, and the beautiful incomprehensible expressions of the deep and divine. I eventually cared some for the rest of the meddling, but ultimately I yearn for the ecstasy watching the gods interface and evolve, Rey dangerously unassuming like infant Christ, Kylo quivering unto kingship, all tenuously balanced, light and dark caught like a leaf shimmering between sun and storm. I want to see Rey again. I want to see Kylo. I want them to fight opposite, and fight together. I'm tempted to say I love these movies, for these reasons, like hormonally-deprived Jane Eyre loved Rochester so soon. I rarely experience cinematic escapism, or indulgent immersive excessive media in general, so I'm confused into calling this love. I don't think it's love, but I did like it, and I miss it, and it kindled both my affection and my reverence by the end. And I think it's exceedingly lame, but it affected me a little.