First of all, yes, there's an actual THEME to The Last Jedi, and through Episode 8, a sense that this is also the third trilogy's overall theme. Episodes VII-IX are about a new generation wresting control of the world from the previous one. It's Millennials vs. Baby Boomers. As someone who falls between the two generations, I may be well suited to see the "war" play out on screen and recognize it, and no, I don't think it's a coincidence the film starts with the Rebels losing all their bombers (bombers/boomers).
On both sides (Imperial/Rebel), there is conflict between the young and the old. It's not a question of Boombers-evil, Millennials-good. There is a generational gap on both sides. But the movie itself places itself in the Millennial camp and the trilogy is at least partly devoted to giving the old heroes a send-off. But if we're replacing Luke, Leia and Han, what are we replacing them with? What did they represent? What is "My father's Star Wars", and what is mine?
Because make no mistake, it IS my father's Star Wars that's being rejected in The Last Jedi. Even the newest film of the original trilogy is more than 30 years old at this point, and the original film just hit 40. Subsequent generations grew up with the films, making it intergenerational, but even Gen-Xers and Baby Busters are getting long in the tooth at this point. The kids, teens and twentysomethings now going to see genre movies have their own heroes, and those heroes must reflect their reality. And I'm sorry to bring up the prequels, but those failed partly on this same basis - they did not manage to reflect the values of youth in the early 2000s.
And then there's Luke Skywalker. In refusing to help Rey do what he, at her age, did, he's very much cast in the Baby Boomer mold. He's the hippie who participated in all the civil rights demonstrations, but then became part of the status quo, and let cynicism and pragmatism take hold. Changing the world is for the young, resisting that change for the old. When he was a master and accidentally "created" Kylo Ren, it was out of fear of the younger generation, of what change it might bring. Kylo, feeling rejected, gives in to the Dark Side. Luke paints Rey with the same brush ("kids today...") and refuses to train her. The enlightened Yoda tells him Rey can't learn anything from the shrine that she doesn't already have access to. She's stolen the books, but saying it to Luke this way is a rejection of the old order and the old way of doing things. Luke would destroy the Jedi shrine to put an end to the faith he's rejected (so, with the same hubris he previously called out the Jedi for having), but Yoda does it because it's meaningless. The old ways are not inherently better, they're just a means to keep the status quo.
The Jedi shrine that is destroyed, then, might as well be George Lucas' six first films. Yoda tells us a master should teach his strengths and skill, but also, and most of all, his failures, then allow his student to outperform him. In other words, give the new generation everything, do NOT believe in you own "legend" (or think you are always right), and actively encourage it to succeed and do better. There is surely a reason that, on Jedi Island, there's a cave representing the Dark Side, and in that cave is a mirror that shows past and future. And that this is what Luke fears. That his past was a lie and that his future is about losing all he's worked for. Rey, on the other hand, does not fear the cave. And when asked to show her her parents, she sees only herself. In other words, she MADE herself.
And here we leave the Chosen One narrative long before Kylo Ren drops the big Truth (unless he's lying, Abrams may well decide to upend the revelation in the final film): There's nothing special about Rey's bloodline, nor does there need to be. This is also a film where the Top 1% are cast as immoral weapons dealers who get rich on the suffering of others. Manifest destiny, genetic/class exceptionalism, that's the old order. Rey is strong because she's had to be. And I really do hope they don't feel the need to pacify all the nerd theorist who are screaming bloody murder because they wasted their time dazzling their friends with genealogical exercises to tie Rey to the Skywalkers or Kenobis. If any of us can make a difference - and surely, that's embedded in the fabric of the film - then it's more important for Rey to be a nobody (just like Poe and Finn are essentially nobodies) - than for her to somehow be an anointed heir to a Forcetune. The Chosen One narrative has failed us in the real world; it's created more monsters than heroes. And guess what, that's always been true of that Galaxy far far away.
All of this isn't to say the "Millennial" characters in the story are overwhelmingly positive figures (just as I do not mean to represent every individual Boomer or Millennial in this essay, only generational TRENDS). Kylo Ren is, of course, a youthful character who has given in to his generation's worst traits. He is prone to tantrums, feels like his heroes and parental figures have all abandoned him, and is self-destructive. He wants the whole world to burn. That's HIS solution to a corrupt status quo. No idealism, no hope, and that's why The Last Jedi drives that hope to the brink of extinction. So it can be reborn in our heroes. But Kylo may never be redeemed. When he turns against Snoke, it's not to embrace the Light. It's to go deeper into the Dark. He rejects this abusive father figure, and takes his place. He gives in to a youthful nihilism that only a generation that's been given the rawest possible deal might slip into. Faced with a "bad world", he wants to destroy it. Rey and her friends want to change it and save it. That's the conflict at the heart of the franchise, and never better spelled out.
A new generation may well embrace this paradigm, and take ownership of that an older generation might consider their foibles, as actual strengths. Finn proudly owning "Rebel scum" feels like one of the crispest summations of that idea.
And if Star Wars fans really rage as much as the Internet makes them out to, I have to wonder if they understand their favorite franchise at all. If you're angry the film makers didn't make the choices you would have, don't you know giving in to anger leads to the Dark Side? If you're angry at diversity casting, don't know you the Empire was based on the Nazis? If you're nitpicking about comical porgs, have you been hating Star Wars since the very beginning (oh don't wait for Ewoks, R2-D2 has been there from the first scene)? And if your beef is that The Last Jedi just rejected everything you thought made Star Wars what it is, that may actually have been the point.
It's about a REBELLION, guys. Or are your rebel years too far behind you to remember that?
Comments
And again, there's a push and pull here, because Millennial Poe is trying to take his place in the world, but so is the female Vice-Admiral.
The thing that is likely to sink the Millennials is the same thing that sank the Boomers and every other generation: the youthful conceit that they can do no wrong, and the faith in principles that have never actually been put to the test. Such "principles" often turn out to be self-interest with an unrealistic self-image.
The bad thing that Luke allegedly almost did, to my way of thinking, is a much more positive way of framing this: the problem with idealism is that it inevitably smacks into the real world where there are no great solutions. Do you want another Darth Vader to appear in a decade? Well then you have a tough choice to make, and sometimes the right choice is the one that damns you while saving everyone else. Or sometimes, you inadvertently save everyone else by not taking the pragmatic course -- but more likely you're keeping your own hands clean and making everyone else pay the price. That's the central tension of being a good guy in a universe that doesn't always allow clean solutions.
With regard to how the young are rebels but then they eventually become custodians of the status quo, Ima let Ben Sisko handle this one:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fQsM7rVk5yA
While watching, I found myself conflicted often during the movie. Until I kinda got it. At some point, when my hero (being older) isolated himself completely, and the young hero (my new hero :D ) just left with a "fuck it, I'll do this myself" attitude. It hit me... these new young heroes are not part of the "rebellion" they came up in a "resistance". Resistance and rebellion are not the same. And these new heroes are the "new Rebellion", they now must rebel against the "first order" and against the Resistance. They need to go further.
This made me enjoy the rest of the movie and made me watch it again. I am, if by my generation, part of the Resistance, but in my heart, I will always be a Rebel. Being a rebel makes me stand with this new generation of heroes.
This movie made one of the saddest parts of The Force Awakens even sadder. Han's death, is now so hard... He died because he represented the older generation, but he was also a sacrifice of the rebelion, Han wasn't part of the Resistance... He left. Not that he didn't believe in what the Resistance did... He failed the resistance, he failed his familly, he failed at everything, exept one thing... he was always a rebel.
Bass: Great point about the semantics at work.
Even if we do, Luke doesn't know that, so the message stands.
To me, the key was Yoda's line, "Failure, the greatest teacher is...".
Every plan in the film fails but it is how characters react to these failures initially or eventually that cast them in a different light. Whether the duality is between optimism/pessimism, or a desire to exert control versus a kind of zen "bending with the wind", or even activism/passivity, each character has an arc defined by response to failure, I think.
I think many 'fans" have objected on a superficial level to a distinct lack of chest-beating triumphalism. It's a little lazy thematically to say this but that how Empire Strikes Back can be perceived, too...
Probably not. I'll eventually see it, and when I do, if it's really as "Millennials Good, Boomers Bad" as you make it sound, I'll despise it on its own terms.
There is a lot I am tempted to say, as I have been embroiled in American politics for the past several years and I am disgusted by most of my countrymen. So let me just say that the "innocence" of youth is wholly overrated, and the only good that comes with it is the potential for enlightenment. The willingness to listen and learn in humility (while still reserving the right to question and challenge) remains the best way to achieve that potential, no matter what Yoda says.
"but I'm also right about idealism vs. cynicism. They're sides of the same coin."
I disagree on that one. Idealism is, ideally, about looking for the good despite being aware of the overabundance of bad. Cynicism is just useless refusal to engage. I don't even see that they're on the same coin. If idealism is sharing a coin with anything, it's with pragmatism.
The trolley problem remains a point of fascination because nobody has come up with truly satisfying solutions -- the (life-respecting) principles that allow one to perceive one outcome as at least marginally better than the other, also deem that better outcome to be intolerable. The idealism / pragmatism coin just flips and flips and flips.
The classic and prequel trilogies were directed by Baby Boomers. They dealt with a generation of chosen-one characters meant to change (or save) the universe.
The sequel trilogy is directed by Generation X. They deal with a generation of latchkey-kid characters coming to terms with a universe that was never quite saved by the aspirations of the last generation.
The next trilogy will likely be directed by some Millennials and focus on characters talking on the Holonet while they built hip new galactic startups... ;)
Anon: It's not so much a Good/Bad as an exploration of the gap between then, and (in more universal terms) the younger generation seeking to go their own way, and mostly failing. But you gotta let 'em try, is what the film seems to be saying.
As for the idealism and cynicism, they're on the coin of what trap we may fall in based on our age's point of view. You're only idealistic because you haven't seen enough. You're only cynical because you've seen too much. Or so each side would tell the other.
This franchise has always been like this. Always!
I don't even think Han did anything particularly stupid in TFA. But in the context of the discussion above, he's the one who HASN'T changed since the first trilogy, and that's particularly SAD. And it's meant to be. The universe has moved on without him, and his boyish smirk and cavalier attitude isn't so cute anymore.
I completely agree that plot points are recycled a heck of a lot, and if you want to say it doesn't break with the past ENOUGH, I will agree with you. But let's not pretend, beloved though it is, that the Star Wars franchise somehow used to be a bastion of good writing.