Obi-Wan Kenobi (2022)

Agreed. I just re-read it. I found my old copy of Heir to the Empire and just flew right through it. I didn't have copies of the other two, so I found them on Amazon and devoured those very quickly, too.

 

Loved the Zahn series. It really is amazing how badly Disney screwed up the sequel trilogy. The fact that they didn’t go into the Force Awakens with a defined, three-picture story arc is utterly insane.

They also didn’t learn from the prequel trilogy, which killed off arguably its best villain this side of Darth Vader in the first film and followed him up with an asthmatic cyborg and a septuagenarian. Building up Kylo and Snoke as the big bads, and then turning Kylo and killing off Snoke to bring back clone Palpatine — with little to no explanation in the films — was a huge mistake.

 

I think Johnson was setting it up for the final duel to be Kylo vs. Rey, but Abrams / Disney didn't have the nerve to have a "popular" character or a more nuanced battle like that. So instead, we get the revival of the series' Big Bad for one last battle.

 

Count me as one who really liked The Last Jedi. It did something different. Did the unexpected while still being Star Wars.

I always thought the backlash was a lot more calculated than organic as well. It's a much smaller group of people (incels) who led a campaign that seemed to have many more people than it actually did, starting with the review bombs.

 

I loved The Last Jedi, and it's one of the few things in the S'Wars extended universe that my wife enjoyed as well. (Other things - Some of HEY MANDO, Rogue One, the back half of Empire.) The visuals are just so damn good in it, and while not every story point "hits," at least it does some shit.

 

It is one of many things they should have learned from the books, which had the guts to go there with a storyline ending with a final battle between Jacen Solo, who had turned to the dark side, and his twin sister Jaina.

 

Don't get me wrong. If they can find a way to go forward with Rey, that's great. That is probably a better way to go forward, with newer characters rather than relying on the original trilogy.

That said, what I like about The Mandalorian is that it did what the sequels tried to do, created new characters and told a good story with them while still weaving in the characters from the original trilogy. I'm sure some people rolled their eyes at the Luke Ex Machina in Season 2, but not many because it was executed so well despite the fact that CGI Luke looked a little weird. When they kept Boba Fett in a smaller role, it worked. The same is true of Ahsoka, though I have hope that with Rosario Dawson in the role, that series can also be good. They created a good mix of old and new, conflict and hope, balances the sequels struggled with.

I keep taking it back to what they are now calling the Legends books. I understand that the actors were too old to do something similar in the movies. The time for that was the late '80s and it wasn't realistic for many reasons. But those stories showed how you can create conflict and even tragedy for the original characters without making all of their lives turn out depressing. They mostly threw out Han Solo's character development from the original trilogy. They broke his relationship with Leia but did it off screen. They broke Luke entirely, with just a brief reminder of what he used to be at the end of The Last Jedi. They didn't have the patience to actually show us those stories.

The books gave us Luke actually rebuilding the Jedi Order, building a life for himself with a wife and a child, but they constantly challenged him and had him deal with a horrible loss later in the series. Han and Leia stayed together, but they lost one son to death and another to the dark side. They actually gave us time with those children, time we never got with Ben Solo, so those losses mattered. The story of Jacen Solo's fall was complex and tragic and it was given time to feel organic. Ben Solo's turn was told in a couple of flashbacks.

It just sucks they blew the opportunity to tell those stories for a rushed, discombobulated trilogy that left just about everybody burned out on the Skywalker Saga.

 

Agreed. They pretty much caved to the lunatic fan base that couldn’t believe a director didn’t want to just rehash the previous films.

Well said.

 

Your commentary on the new series has been outstanding. That said, I have not watched one second of it and from reading your posts I have no idea whether I should. What is your bottom line there?

 

Thank you. I think any Star Wars fan should see The Force Awakens and The Last Jedi. Both are flawed, but worthwhile in their own way. Just understand going in that Rise of Skywalker is a convoluted mess and you most likely won't find a satisfying conclusion at the end of the trilogy. There are so many ways that the original trilogy is better than the sequels. One big one is that they actually present a coherent story, aside from a few details. (ahem...Leia kissing Luke, then later saying she always knew they were brother and sister...ahem). The sequels don't have that. The biggest disappointment, however, was the utter failure to stick the landing. Return of the Jedi sticks the landing. Rise 0f Skywalker does not.

 

I’m more talking the new series that’s out right now, Andor. All the movies, to me, are flawed to a degree and range from awesome (IV, V and VI) to really good (VII, Rogue One), to good (III), to pretty good (VIII, IX) to ok (Solo) to bad (I) to Ishtar (II). I love Mando, liked Obi Wan and tolerated Mando Lite. Andor’s reactions have covered that scale, depending on whose opinion it is. Should I watch that?

 

I said it a little earlier, but I really like it. I think it is one of the best things Star Wars has done. Maybe not as good as Mandalorian, but it is up there. It is a slow burn at times, but it is dark and shows a different side of the Empire than we have seen. Which is becoming very brutal as we go along. I have seen varying opinions on it, but I think it is a pretty good character study, too, and going far away from Jedi and Skywalker stuff. Way behind the scenes of what we are used to.