Millennials Strike Back: An Esoteric Reading of the Last Jedi
firstthings.com
firstthings.com
> But she has absorbed the rebels’ self-serving narrative, and it prevents her from realizing that the Skywalkers and the Rebellion—or Resistance, or whatever they are calling themselves now—have no answers.
The answer is "not fascism." The Empire and First Order are fascist regimes. Fighting fascism is the answer. There is no perfect system. But systems that support the systematic oppression of all people via threat of violence are evil.
I think it's enough that a guy like Snopes or Palpatine wanted to control the galaxy to rebel against that.
A rebellion against fact-checking? The movie is now even more relevant ;-)
Rey and Kylo unite? Nah. Leia dies? Nah. Luke overcomes pain and returns as a master? Nah. Finn does something impactful and important? Nah. Poe is a hero? Nah.
Like, imagine if instead of Admiral Holdo it were all Leia. It sure as hell felt like it was supposed to be Leia. Imagine Leia never went into a coma, but she was clearly terrified by her near death and experience with the Force and upset over the loss of the command staff. (I mean, Admiral Ackbar is dead!) What if it were Leia's sacrifice at the end? I can't help but feel it should have been, and not because of Carrie Fisher's loss.
The problems inherent to the narrative, like Luke Skywalker being completely without hope when he literally is the New Hope are just... weird, and it goes on a bit too long. Yoda should've shown up sooner. I get that Jedi masters are old and crusty and don't want to teach the ways of the Force anymore. I get that the Jedi were wrong to ignore all emotion. Qui Gon was wrong to take Anakin away from his mother and leave her behind. Obi Wan was wrong to hide Vader's identity from Luke. Yoda was wrong in Empire Strikes Back to tell Luke to let his friends die. Luke is wrong to tell Rey to leave. Luke was right about Vader in Return of the Jedi. Rey was right to go to Kylo (surprisingly, somewhat). What does Obi-Wan tell Luke in A New Hope? "Trust your feelings. Let go." It seems that Jedi only gain enlightenment in death.
What the Jedi have done out of fear of the Dark Side is eliminate all emotions and therefore all virtue. The Jedi are not good. They're neutral. They're safe.
But safety doesn't make heroes. Safety doesn't protect your friends. Safety doesn't overcome tyranny.
In the end, again, Luke does overcome his despair. Again he follows his feelings and helps his friends, even at the cost of his own life.
Say what you will about the end of TLJ, but Luke still died a hero.
from the point of view of a regular citizen or a slave - the 2 fractions of the higher caste (consisting of, practically speaking, biologically different people, super-humans, basically almost different species), Jedi Order and First Order, are fighting for the power. Both sides are using super-power to enforce their will upon regular people. Somehow a regular person should be able to identify one side as not fascism, as not evil, and start to fight for it.
And yet they are continually giving birth to it.
The clone army becomes the storm troopers of the empire.
The senator of the republic becomes the emperor.
Anakin becomes Vader.
Luke trains Kylo.
It seems a negative statement is not a viable solution, which is what Luke realized.
> The views expressed in this article are not endorsed by and do not in any way represent the opinions of their employers or Leo Strauss. They should also not be taken to express the views of the authors.
I went into this movie full on ignoring the metaphorical connections to the real world and let it exist in my mind as just an entertaining movie and story and to my surprise, it blew me away (although obviously far from perfect).
Its interesting to see people pick this movie apart, as if the originals had perfect acting, no flaws, and were the epitome of originality (were you expecting your life to change after watching this?)
Personally, I think Luke's change in demeanor was perfect, which not so ironically, he is pretty far from. Luke is human, which he conveys very well and is probably what upsets people the most because he doesn't reach this state of perfection upon which he has mastered the force, his feelings (he's not Leonard Nimoy), and has total control of self (again, not a Leonard Nimoy).
Could it be possibly that people are still holding onto the idea fed to those of us born in the 80's and onward that every one of us is "special", that our dreams will come true if we just believe in ourselves and never give up? These may be the people that do not care for the more realistic approach to Luke Skywalker, as opposed to the "one who will bring balance to the force."
I think the Disney movies don't even try to tell a good story. The plots barely make sense and frequently violate established rules and conventions for no apparent reason. Apart from perhaps Kylo Ren, the new characters are static and uninteresting. Rey is likeable but has no growth. Finn is likable but isn't believable as an ex-stormtrooper. The relationship between The First Order and the Resistance/Rebellion is muddled and confusing at best. Where the prequels dwelt too much on tedious political details, the sequels go the other direction fail to establish a compelling galactic context for the war. As for Rogue One, I enjoyed that in the way I enjoy a dumb, mindless action movie. The characters were bland and uninteresting and the plot was just barely good enough to keep me interested.
The original trilogy had a good well-focused story, a good plot, a simple but sufficiently compelling political context, likable characters that experienced legitimate growth and character arcs. It had exceptional editing, great pacing--albeit slower than any blockbuster you'd see today-- and amazing sound design and music. There are some flaws, and some internal inconsistencies. But it's easy to argue that the major ones, such as Vader being revealed as Luke's father, enhance the story more than detract from it. It makes Obi-Wan's character seem less virtuous, for example-- but he's a fairly minor character and a minor flaw isn't a problem anyway, it makes him seem more human.
The original Lucas trilogy wasn't perfect, but it's far superior to either the prequels or the Disney sequels.
That's not what I'm seeing at all. What I'm seeing is:
The originals, for all their flaws, established and maintained an expansive universe with internally consistent rules and characters. The plots made sense and plot holes rarely undermined the important story or thematic elements. The characters had consistent flaws and experienced growth and real character arcs. The new movies' plots' are barely coherent, shatter suspension of disbelief by constantly violating the rules and conventions of the setting, have characters that range from likeable but boring to annoying and unlikable, and include way too many awkward humor attempts with off-beat non-sequitors.
Luke Skywalker is an established character. He was a whiny, impulsive, stargazing youth who ventured into the unknown world beyond for adventure, experiencing struggle, hardship, and loss; finally overcoming those inner demons to rescue his friends (who had suffered because of him) and stand up to the Emperor and redeem his father. This is not to say that you can't turn him into a despondent, disillusioned recluse who casually considers cold-blooded murder, but you need to get him there somehow with a convincing narrative. What I'm seeing consistently is people do not buy the provided explanations. (Although one should also ask if this change really adds anything positive to the story)
The new movies, partiularly TFA and TLJ, completely unravel the established rules and established characters. And it's not that these rules are incredibly restrictive, there's volumes and volumes of Expanded Universe content exploring a huge range of themes and narratives and virtually all of them make a reasonable effort to respect and adhere to the established rules and characters in the Universe. (My favorite is the Thrawn Trilogy from Timothy Zahn, while others like Knights of the Old Republic video game...). Disney easily could have told broadly appealing Star Wars stories without violating all these rules and irritating old-school fans for no reason.
Could it be possibly that people are still holding onto the idea fed to those of us born in the 80's and onward that every one of us is "special", that our dreams will come true if we just believe in ourselves and never give up?
Well, the Rey character seems like the perfect icon for entitled Millenials. She's special just because she's her. She's a nobody but can do everything better than anyone with no effort so long as she has the self-esteem to act. Where Luke had to struggle and learn and grow Rey just mostly coasts.
Also note that young Anakin's narrative was essentially "the fall of a prodigy," so it made sense for him to be exceptional in many ways from the beginning. All the established Jedi characters observed him to be something special and unusual (midi-chlorians were stupid at the detail level, but at least it's purpose in the plot consistent with the story goals). Lucas even added a prophecy narrative to explain Anakin's exceptional powers. And even then Anakin still has to train.
There are stories to tell that don't involve how Anakin screwed over the galaxy for multiple generations.
Instead of just getting a 2 hour movie every year or two, they can spend a lot more screen hours building characters and themes and showing the downtime between the battles and big events. There is going to be more Star Wars TV in the future and I wouldn't blow it off just because it doesn't seem aimed at you.
>> I wouldn't blow it off just because it doesn't seem aimed at you
Who said anything remotely like that?
Point being, they're spending a lot of money and want to play it safe. You can do much more in a novel than a blockbuster movie. They do have decades of past original content to draw off of but there's most likely a larger general movie fanbase than those that did the deep dive into the books so might as well appeal to them.
"Similar but different".
The authors take many liberties in interpretation to fit their viewpoint. For instance, Luke didn't "hallucinate" Yoda's presence on Ahch-To, unless you think his previous force ghosts (as in ROTJ) were hallucinations, as well. Perhaps Rian did mean for Yoda's force ghost in this scene to be a hallucination, but I don't think he did. The authors just twisted this scene to fit their interpretation, which is disappointing.
UPDATE: The piece is satire https://twitter.com/smcohoe/status/951474247104307200
As far as I can see, the only thing approaching a coherent theme in TLJ is the question of how one can move forward if encumbered by the past (Finn and Rey also have these issues). This offers perhaps 1% of the thematic and political subtly of the Lucas trilogies. But even this seems a challenge for the script to grapple with coherently -- surely Yoda (presented as a figure of wisdom) should not be using lightning and fire (Sith tools) to destroy embodied wisdom. And if we are to view Luke as doing the right thing then surely the only logical conclusion of this way of thinking is that Kylo Ren is on the right track.
Ironic that Poe Dameron (who destroys most of the Rebellion) is seen negatively when all he was doing was clearing the way for victory by getting rid of all those ships (human lives)!
And then remember the final scene on the Falcon, where you can clearly see that the books are safely with Rey. She must have taken them before she left, and Yoda knows this.
In that period of time, though, the audience (and Luke) is left to believe that Yoda truly did choose to destroy ancient Jedi artifacts. Which really makes one wonder what the heck is going on—and leaves you to question which side is good, and which is bad? It really blurs the lines between Light and Dark, and crescendos at the throne room scene where Snoke is murdered to when Kylo asks Rey to join him. You almost want her to say yes to his offer! Unlike ESB, the offer isn't just theoretical. Snoke was just overthrown.
In my opinion, the whole sequence was masterfully done.
It doesn't bother me if people like TLJ, although I personally don't think the film makes much sense. If Yoda deceives Luke that saves TLJ from having Yoda actually mirror Kylo Ren, but it doesn't explain the fire and lightning (Sith tools associated with hell imagery) nor does it resolve the underlying problem since deception is also Dark Side behaviour....
There are a few other areas where the film contradicts itself, but this is an obvious one: if we take the film seriously we must surely ask ourselves why Yoda is acting like a Sith Lord? I didn't see any attempt to answer that puzzle in the film and while we may get the solution in film #3, as far as I can tell TLJ just accepts that whatever Yoda does is good (because he is Yoda) and whatever Kylo Ren does is bad (because he is the villain). The filmmakers have bought into the loose symbolic framework of the saga, but they don't seem to understand it and/or act consistently within it. To the extent there is a message, it comes out because the good guys tell us exactly what it is and we aren't supposed to think too critically about it.
It comes down to intent. Fire, lightning, and destruction aren't relegated to the Dark Side of the Force. Jedis have always had their share of destruction and murder. They were a literal army during the time of the Old Republic. Obi-Wan and Qui-Gon's behavior in the first scenes of TPM show this firsthand. They were sent to the Trade Federation to intimidate—not a very noble thing to do on the surface, but it was in the greater good.
There have been innumerable essays and analyses understanding how the two sides differ, but the one that's always stuck with me is that the Jedi are at their core more of a guiding force, whereas the Sith are a controlling force.
Everything the Sith do is for their own greater good, whereas the Jedi will do things (even kill, or destroy) if it leads to the greater good of others.
And, in this case, the destruction of the temple leads Luke to understand that old books aren't what are important. No one died when that tree was destroyed. And it may very well have been what pushed Luke to self-sacrifice and save the remnants of the Resistance. That seems like a very "Jedi" thing to do (IMO).
There is nothing in the film that communicates this. It may be that we are supposed to view the film this way, but the film itself is not sophisticated in communicating this message. Meanwhile, there are many characters who are clearly well-intentioned (Poe and Finn) whose actions seem to be explicitly criticized.
Lucas was a far more sophisticated filmmaker. In his prequels the Jedi are deeply flawed, and the audience is supposed to notice that they abandon their commitment to peace ("I can protect you, but I cannot fight a war for you") to the point that they die (literally and allegorically) marching into war. Likewise, Luke's effort to rescue his friends in Empire is well-intentioned, but nearly destroys him because he chooses violence as his tool (similar to Anakin's efforts to rescue Padme through violence). It is not accidental that the temptation that Vader offers Luke is the same temptation Palpatine offers Anakin: the use of violence for the sake of good ("join me, and bring peace and order to the galaxy") -- a trap in both films.
I thought they were rather explicit about the "learning from mistakes" theme.
> The original Star Wars films (Episodes IV-VI) celebrated the revolutions of the 1960s and 1970s
> Leia’s use of the Force to return, zombie-like, to a position of leadership and oversee further disasters is another instance of boomers’ misusing their privileges to cling to their hegemony as long as they can.
> Note that in none of the eight movies so far is the intensive and painful Jedi training regimen followed through.
> The film’s meta-commentary is that the revolutions of 1968 and following accomplished nothing.
UPDATE: The entire piece is definitely satire, which explains why the opinions expressed within it are so silly. :)
But most of the points it makes are before then anyhow, and I can't find anything wrong with it before then.
> The views expressed in this article are not endorsed by and do not in any way represent the opinions of their employers or Leo Strauss. They should also not be taken to express the views of the authors.
(In 20th century history, WWI was the war of the clueless generals, while in WWII, both sides had relatively competent leadership.)
> A few hypothetical reasons why light speed attacks are not common despite being so effective:
> - A capital ship's particle shields can usually tank smaller objects, like fighters, traveling at relativistic speeds. Only very large objects can attain enough kinetic energy to punch through the shields. However...
> - ...the size and complexity of the engines required to accelerate an object to light speed increase geometrically with mass. Outfitting a dense asteroid with a hyperdrive system would make for a hideously expensive one-shot missile; it's almost always more practical to invest your year's worth of Mon Cala's GDP in a ship, which has broader sustained applications.
> - The calculations for hyperspace jumps to or from gravity wells are incredibly fraught. Because of latency issues and certain limitations of droid cognition, an extremely skilled pilot must be physically onboard to perform the jump; no one wants to waste a pilot like that on a suicide run unless there's no other option.
> - Even a skilled pilot is going to find targeting an individual ship very difficult because extreme velocity and distances turns small errors into big misses. The timing is also crucial; in the Star Wars universe, ships enter a hyperspatial dimension shortly after hitting light speed. If Holdo had accelerated too quickly, she would have passed "through" the Supremacy without hitting it; too slowly, and she wouldn't have accumulated enough energy to overwhelm its shields.
> Holdo only succeeded because a bunch of factors aligned: she was a good pilot, her target was very close and very wide, she had no nearby allies in the blast radius, she and her ship were expendable, and the math broke her way.
[1]: https://fanfare.metafilter.com/10441/Star-Wars-The-Last-Jedi...
However, the blast radius part wouldn't make as much sense, because the escape pods were likely fairly close, just at some orthogonal vector.
However, this is all besides the point. The real problem is that the hyperdrive weapon was never motivated and it introduces plot holes in past movies.
Regardless, I really enjoyed this scene because it falls well within the jurisdiction of the Rule of Cool (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/RuleOfCool)
Throwing a hyperdrive on whatever mass you have handy is a whole different ball game. Unless the hyperdrive itself represents the dominant cost it should be at least two orders of magnitude cheaper going by the cost of ordnance vs the cost of a warship.
And even one order of magnitude would be enough. War is about economics as much as it is about winning battles. If you can force them to build ships that you can destroy at 1/10th the cost with no loss of life (people are a resource /Negan) you are doing good.
Ship to ship combat is not cheap or without risk either. Ships are damaged and lost and in a real war you can lose quite a few of them!
Maybe larger ships require larger, more expensive hyperdrive installations, and are more difficult to install - maybe it's not just a matter of bolting a hyperdrive unit onto something. There might be conduits you have to run all over and throughout the structure, there may be mass and balance concerns, etc.
I don't know enough about the SW universe to really back up my hypothesis. (One of the reasons I'm not a huge fan of the SW universe as a playground for the mind is that it's fairly inconsistent, and the Rule of Cool that another user mentioned tends to trump other considerations. In one sense it's freeing, and in another sense, any given work set in that universe is free to disregard large portions of previous works.)
Or even by the two other captial-ship escorts, which Holdo left to run out of gas and get pointlessly destroyed, so she could save the noble sacrifice scene for herself.
Well... they've got a point... we see many already produced, but none during the films' times IIRC.
You can see this in IT as well where we have myriad foundational problems at the levels of W3C, ICANN, MITRE, NIST and other standards/governing bodies. Cynicism spreads about whether they are sincere about delivering their core missions; meanwhile a "move fast and break things"/disruption culture thrives.
But I think there is some cultural "zeitgeist" reflected in the more optimistic original Star Wars and the cynicism of the current reboot.
I find it refreshingly actually. When the original Star Wars came along it seemed to shut down the cynicism of Sci Fi that had dominated up to that point (Soylent Green, West World, Logan's Run, Rollerball, etc.).
Caleb Cohoe is associate professor of philosophy at Metropolitan State University of Denver. Samantha Cohoe is a Latin teacher, writer of young adult fiction, and frequent contributor to twitter.com. The views expressed in this article are not endorsed by and do not in any way represent the opinions of their employers or Leo Strauss. They should also not be taken to express the views of the authors.
I saw it as the younger generation not learning and repeating the mistakes of the past.
The first order being like neo-nazis to the empires nazis.
The republic failing and the rise of trade federation again.
Very cyclical and nihilistic.
Caleb Cohoe is associate professor of philosophy at Metropolitan State University of Denver. Samantha Cohoe is a Latin teacher, writer of young adult fiction, and frequent contributor to twitter.com. The views expressed in this article are not endorsed by and do not in any way represent the opinions of their employers or Leo Strauss. They should also not be taken to express the views of the authors.
We left the scene at the end of episode 4: The empire was defeated, the good guys had all the power, wisdom and allies on their side, there was a big victory celebration and everything was abuzz with hopes and plans for the future.
Then... things... happened and suddenly everything is reset to the same bad old times.
Yet no one even attempts to find out why this happened and where exactly the old plans and assumptions went wrong (and where they didn't). All that is done is either stoically holding on to the old plans or frustratedly admitting "failure".
I guess you could see this as an analogy to today's times as well: Everyone is panicking that the fascists are back, that inequality is rising, that living standards are falling and that no one is stopping climate change - but there seem few discussions about where exactly things went wrong, except that all it's somehow the baby boomers'/the millennials'/facebook's fault.
https://florin.myip.org/blog/edit-blog-entry-divisive-drama-...
TLDR: The story is basically re-told for the current young generation. There's less "magic", there's more "realism" (mind the quotes). Old mythologies are ignored. There are vast, sweeping cultural shifts such as the rise of feminism. And, yes, there's this youthful drive to declare that the past is dead, long live the future.