Even worse than people trying to excuse the writer’s choice of having Luke almost kill Ben are the people who think Luke actually should have done it
Yes of COURSE Luke should have killed him? “Ben” proved it himself by going on a murder spree right after? Far better him than the students he killed, like how is that even a dilemma.
finn managed to unconsciously, with zero training and also brainwashing and presumably force suppression, move the rocks away while rey only did that after a few failed lessons with luke and weird Force Angst™ with kylo so Um tell me again who the stronger force user is
Also sensed the deaths in Hosnia and knew where they had taken place when Rey didn’t. A novice Luke didn’t sense the destruction of Alderaan and Obi-Wan–a freaking Jedi MASTER trained from childhood–sensed what happened but didn’t realize (or didn’t want to believe) it was Alderaan. Repeat: An untrained Finn surpassed a Jedi Master at Force sensitivity.
god tier theory is that finn and rey were raised side by side in luke’s jedi temple until kale snapped
Luke watches the children from afar: they giggle as they run circles around the older students, the girl trying hard to keep up with the slightly older boy as they dart around the meditating students whose eyes are pinched shut in focus.
Two of his own blood – the oldest boy fidgets as he meditates – the others not, but he loves them all nonetheless.
(After all, as a young man he’d gazed upon the most fearsome visage in the galaxy without hatred. These children, the stars that would bring light to the future – they deserve nothing less.)
He doesn’t chastise the two young ones. They’re children, and children deserve to run, grow their wings, before they can use the Force to fly. He’d felt caged by the sand dunes on Tatoonie, but now he understands that the love he’d been gifted under the roof of the Lars family home is the most precious thing in the galaxy.
The boy screeches to a halt when he realizes Luke is watching them.
“‘orry Master Luke,” he says bashfully, gaze cast towards his feet. If it wasn’t for his dark complexion Luke knows his ears would be a bright red.
The girl, never far from her beloved friend, careens into him. She half-giggles, half-gasps for air, then turns to face her mentor.
“We weren’t being loud – we, we didn’t disturb the older kids. Like you told us – like we promised!”
“Indeed,” Luke replies, crouching forward to meet the girl at eye level. His hands covers his knees and Luke can’t help but notice the girl’s eyes flicker briefly towards his mechanical hand. “You’ve shown restraint and an intent to keep your word, both important Jedi traits.”
The girl gives him a gap toothed grin, while the boy lifts his eyes to meet Luke’s gaze. Their eyes sparkle like twin suns.
When Luke makes it out of the ruins, all he sees are flames and smoke.
Then bodies.
Then the lightsaber wounds.
There are less bodies than students – when he counts the lightsabers, he knows where they’ve gone.
The rest are dead. He knows it, felt their flames go out. All that’s left is ash.
Except – except two.
The girl clings to his robes, tears streaming down her face and soot smudged across her forehead. She cries for her friend, cries out his name, cries for the dead, cries for the luck that had kept her away from the dorms.
He wipes her mind of the trauma, forces her gifts into hiding. He sends her away, knowing that together they’re a more noticeable target. This star, the one that shines bright with kindness and burns with resilience, goes out.
He reaches out one last time before he goes into hiding. The other star, the one that shines bright with promise and burns with compassion – he can no longer find it. He’s gone, but not in the way the other children were extinguished. He was not snuffed out, the flame didn’t slowly dwindle away as life left his body. No screams of terror, no shaky last breaths.
No – he was cut off abruptly, like the girl. But this was not Luke’s doing. More sinster forces are at work.
(He knows what Imperial reconditioning can do. He knows of the ever-growing list of missing children. He fears it.)
Luke sighs, prosthetic hand curling into a fist.
Then he cuts himself off.
He trusts the Force to know when to awaken them.
The last Jedi sits alone on Atch-to.
No, not the last.
First one star reignites, then the other. Luke can feel the twin suns rise.
what TLJ probably meant: poor Kylo Ren look he had a reason to come into the Dark Side his own uncle tried to kill him :’((( it’s also all Luke’s fault, blame him, he gave up on Ben so easy!!
what I, an intellectual, learned form TLJ: if Luke “there is still good in you dad Vader” Skywalker takes one look at Ben Solo’s mind and thinks this one is irredeemable then well, shit, I absolutely believe him
No complaints here. I didn’t really pay much attention to the new Star Wars hype till maybe the 2nd teaser though. That’s probably when I started actually getting excited for it. Other than that I was like, “Sweet.”
I will admit that when the first teaser rolled around, I had no idea that it was taking place 30 years after RotJ, and I thought that the shot of Poe in his X-Wing was a new actor playing Luke, and Finn and Rey were just two new characters he runs into (or a different actress playing undercover Leia?). Seriously, that’s how little I had been paying attention to the new Star Wars stuff.
Kylo Ren would have turned on the Jedi and joined the First Order regardless of whether or not Luke tried to kill him.
Think for a second. Kylo already has a conspiracy of other Dark Side students at his command, ready to attack the temple at a moment’s notice? That shows forethought and preparation. Kylo turned to the Dark Side long before that tragic scene in his hut. Luke attacking him only showed that he’d been discovered and forced him to put his plan into motion early.
Exactly. He used that conflict as a justification to do what he wanted to do anyways. Later he tries to manipulate people into thinking he’s the victim in that situation when in reality it’s much more complicated.
Yeah, this. Also, he had already build his red crossguard ligthsaber and had a change of clothes to assume his Kylo identity laying about. There’s definitely premeditation.
In fact, with new canon the lightsaber is very damning evidence. The only way to get a Dark Side (red) lightsaber is by breaking and corrupting a kyber crystal and kyber does not yield easily. It takes serious effort using the Dark Side to make one, so Kylo was already messing with the dark in a pretty serious way since he had this.
Also while one might argue that “Ben”, had he actually still been good, would have been justified in the situation to pull the building down on Luke’s head since Luke in the situation looks like a threat to him, he is not justified in:
1) Attacking and killing the rest of the students who doesn’t side with him.
2) Burn down the school.
Because you’re not going to convince me that the students woke up in the middle of the night, came out to see the destroyed building and just attacked “Ben” out of hand. Which speaks of premeditated attack on Kylo’s part.
I also remember one of my posts where I was like “why would Rian take the time to show us Luke’s X-Wing in the water? Like of course it will play a role later… he’ll lift it from the water and leave Ahch-To in it, following Rey who is on some rogue mission” But it was just to parallel fucking Yoda…
There is something called
Chekhov’s gun. it is a dramatic principle that states that every single element in a story must be
necessary and you shouldn’t make “false promises” by not using that element again. If not necessary it should be removed from the plot.
Basically:
“If in the first act you have hung a pistol on the wall, then in the
following one it should be fired. Otherwise don’t put it there.”
I’m not saying you have to use this, but as a writer you should know these things exist and that you cannot simply break them without your audience getting mad at you.
Fuck Rian Johnson and fuck that stupid ass Yoda scene
Ah, so Chekov’s gun is the principle Rian Johnson has never heard of… I’ve been describing it several times but I didn’t know how to call it.
It was Chekov’s pistol that shoots blanks. It’s there just for an audience “gotcha!” You can tell because it’s the only time Johnson worried about shoring up a potential plot hole in the minds of viewers. So when we see Luke on Crait, we think, “of course! He used his X-Wing to travel there.”
And then Johnson all but jumps out and yells “HA HA! He’s a Force projection! Aren’t I a clever boy!”
and then he dies… bc he Force projects himself instead of taking the X-Wing? xD
L.J.'s Obsessions 