themandalorianwolf:

A problem I noticed in the last Jedi is that the 4th act is entirely pointless. The reasoning behind this is that all of the character arcs are already over. Even if I didn’t agree with the character arcs of the film, which I didn’t because of the execution and poor writing of them, I realized for better or worse, that they were over.

Luke: Accepting Failure

After spending years in exile because of his failure as a teacher and a Jedi, Luke comes to terms with his mistakes. His failure may always haunt him, yet it is only through those mistakes that he can learn. The young, idealistic boy from Tatooine might be gone, but Luke Skywalker, will always be Luke Skywalker and it’s time to do what’s right and stop hiding from the war. It’s time for the old Jedi ways end, but the New Jedi will rise from its ashes.

Rey: Accepting failure part 2

Rey thought she was powerful enough to stop Snoke by herself, to turn Kylo and end the war, but all she did was trade one supreme Leader for another. You can’t change people, only they can change themselves. Regardless, Rey refuses to let her own morals be compromised and stands once more against the First Order. Like Luke, Rey accepts her failure and knows she has to move forward from it if she is to save the Galaxy from the Fist Order.

Finn: Resolving inner conflict

There has always been conflict inside Finn, a conflict of not knowing where he belonged in the galaxy. Morality vs survival. After defeating Phasma, Finn has finally realized that his place is with the Resistance. For better or worse, Finn has chosen to fight not only for himself or Rey, but for the Resistance. Finn will fight till his dying breath to stop the First Order and save the galaxy from a life he had to endure himself.

Kylo: Resolving inner conflict Part 2

After killing Snoke, the man who showed him the darkness within himself, Kylo embraces his own philosophy of letting the past to die. The Jedi, Sith, Snoke, the Republic, and his family were all wrong. The galaxy will only make sense if you force it to. Kylo has resolved the conflict within himself and resigns himself to the dark side. The galaxy will bow to his will or die.

Poe: Learning humility

After a series of disobeying and questioning orders, winning and losing battles, Poe learns that sometimes you must have faith and hope in a bleak situation and trust in others. Poe accepts that he isn’t right all of the time and in this war you have to be willing to step back and let others handle the situation.

I might not agree with a lot of these character arcs, Luke and Poe, and I might think their arcs are very weak or illogical, Rey and Finn, and I might still have more questions, Kylo, but in the end I can recognize that their arcs are over for this movie and the stage is set for episode 9.

Here’s the damn problem

The movie keeps going!

The battle on Crait was pointless and took away from the moments we just had. Imagine at the ending of Empire strikes back, instead of ending the film at their highest moment and getting ready to set the stage for the next movie, the film keeps playing and we have another chase and showdown with Vader! We just had a climax and instead of being given time to comprehend what we just saw, we are distracted by another climax! It’s ruins the moments we just had.

Crait exists for 1 reason: To get rid of Luke Skywalker

Nothing else happens on Crait.

Rey:

She literally disappears from the story. Why? Because her character arc is done in the film. She doesn’t get to see Luke, her mentor, one last time before he dies. As confirmed by canon (RJ) Rey closing the door on Kylo is the force bond ending, but we can assume it was ended by Snoke dying anyway so that scene is a bust. And Rey leaves the battle after destroying some tie fighters, conveniently not being present for the Kylo vs Luke fight.

Finn:

Everything on Crait at this point just seems like a rehash of what Finn went through in TFA. The First Order has a super weapon, Finn comes up with a plan to destroy it, then he decides to sacrifice himself but is stooped last second. He hugs Rey wordlessly, then doesn’t say or do anything else for the rest of the movie. This doesn’t do anything for the character because we already know Finn is not going to die and killing him now would be wasting the character arc we just saw anyway, so Crait doesn’t matter for him either.

Kylo:

This last act hurts Kylo the most, because all it does is make him look unredeemable in every sense of the word. There is nothing redeeming about Kylo on Crait. He’s behaving like a cartoon villain and literally saying he’s going to destroy everyone, family and all. But it also doesn’t further his character either because even though Luke died because of him, Kylo still didn’t kill him personally, so Kylo escapes blame. So it adds no redeeming qualities, no development as a villain, and just makes him look more unstable and unsympathetic.

Poe:

He doesn’t do anything… I can’t even make an argument why it hurts his character arc, mostly because he doesn’t do anything in the 4th act. No one does.

And you see that is the real problem with the 4th act. Hux, Leia, Poe and everyone else are rendered pointless observers in the 4th act as slaves of a film that just won’t end. Even Finn’s “sacrifice” only exists for Rose to stop him in one of the most bafflingly stupid scenes in the movie.

Rose saves Finn from sacrificing himself because it’s wrong to fight what you hate, you need to save what you love. She then kisses him and passes the fuck out till episode 9. This makes no fucking sense for 2 reasons:

1. Both Holdo and Paige sacrificed themselves for the Resistance. Finn wasn’t fighting what he hates, he was trying to save everyone he loves, Rey, Poe, BB, etc, from the First Order. Without someone stopping the canon, everyone will die. None of them knew Luke was gong to show up. The door is even destroyed as Rose kisses Finn! The logic is so dumb here I think Rian was actually high.
2. It was never established that Rose felt that way about Finn. They’ve only known each other for 18 hours… most of it was spent disliking each other. It’s not that I have a problem with the relationship, if it was developed, but it wasn’t. Like Rey randomly trusting Kylo, it feels like we’ve jumped ahead to a different movie where more character development has happened than what we’ve seen. Also the fact that everyone is about to be murdered horrifically greatly takes away from any romance.

The entire last act doesn’t work at all. It’s a blatant ripoff of Hoth, it doesn’t develop any of the characters further, and it hurts any development the characters did have.

How it should of ended:

Hux walks through the throne room, stopping at the supreme leader‘s throne and stares down at Snoke’s corpse, a perplexed and confused look falls upon his face. Nothing about this made sense, but for some reason, the supreme leader‘s corpse confused the general the most…

Turning on his heel, Hux sees the unconscious Kylo Ren. The dark sider didn’t seem to be dead, which raised even more questions in Hux’s calculating mind. Whatever had happened here, he could not let it happen again.

The general reached inside of his coat, reaching for a weapon he had sworn he would never expose. Just as his gloved fingers began to grasp his weapon, The Master of Ren began to wake. Hux let his hand drop.

Kylo stood up, not even bothering to acknowledge the carnage around him. The two men eyed each other with uncertainty. Kylo can sense that Hux was shielding his intentions from him, yet did not voice his thoughts.

The Master of Ren orders Hux to pullback their fleet. They needed to regroup on Mustafar with the other Knights of Ren.

General Hux explodes in rage, stating that he does not take orders from the supreme leader’s dog. Hux then feels his throat closing and grabs his neck.

The Imperial March plays as Kylo Ren declares himself supreme leader of the First Order.

The general refuses to submit even as he is dying. Hux threatens Kylo that if he were to die, then Kylo will never make it off of the ship alive. They will either work together or both die.

Kylo releases the general and says from here on out the First Order will focus on their true mission. Kylo declares Hux as the Grand Marshal of the First Order.

Hux orders his fleet to pull back, and says that Kylo better pray the force isn’t leading him astray. The Grand Marshal then leaves.

The new Supreme Leader casts one last look at the planet, then turns away. Picking up half of the destroyed lightsaber that had belonged to his grandfather.

The Resistance had arrived on Crait. The base is a Hidden relic that was established after the end of the first galactic civil war. The resistance is smaller, but hope is not gone. Kaydel Connix begins to radio out to the New Republic, informing them of the Resistance’s survival. General Organ and Poe begin to recount their loses and plan their next move. Time was not their friend.

Outside of the base Finn is helping the remaining resistance members when the Falcon lands. Finn knows who is inside the ship before the tracker Poe had returned to him even began to go off. The hatch opens and there stands Rey, bruised, battered, and holding a broken half of a lightsaber.

Finn looks back at Rose who pushes him forward. Chewie does the same to Rey. The two walk towards each other and stop a bit away from the other awkwardly.

Finn remarks that Rey changed her hair, Rey replies that Finn got a new jacket.

Realizing that he’s still wearing the First Order uniform, Finn throws off the coat, earning a smile from Rey. The two stare at each other once more and quickly close the distance between them and hug each other tightly.

Back inside the base, General Organa orders everyone to get inside the Falcon. It’s then that C3-PO tells her that an X-Wing has landed. Leia smiles and tells him it’s not a problem, but C3-PO begins to panic until a familiar face tells him to calm down.

Luke Skywalker winks and offers his half brother a gentle smile and then goes to see his sister. The two living legends sit across from each other and suddenly all of the pain and loneliness of the last few years seems to lessen and fade slightly.

Luke apologizes for his absence and says that he is here to make things right. Leia confesses that she is happy that Luke is here and understands that her son is gone. The old Jedi tells her that no one is ever really gone and places Han Solo‘s dice in her hands.

All of the Resistance is almost in the Falcon, each one stopping to give their thanks to Chewie and Rey. Poe greets Rey warmly and says it is good to see her again, Rey says likewise. Rose, just as excited as she was when she met Finn, introduces herself to the Jedi, but this time with confidence. Rey only replies that she knows who Rose is and calls her a hero. Rose beams proudly.

As the last of the resistance members file into the millennium falcon, Rey stands at the hatch to see Luke staring back at her. Mentor and student together once more. There is much they have to tell the other and many apologies to be done.

Luke reaches into his robe and holds out a lightsaber – his lightsaber. The green lightsaber that had been by his side for decades.

Rey stares from the lightsaber to Luke, tears in her eyes and she does what she had dreamed about for so long – Rey hugs Luke and the man returns her affection warmly. She then grabs the lightsaber from him.

The Millennium Falcon and Luke’s X-wing take off side by side into into lightspeed.

The End

Why does this ending work better than the other one? Because it doesn’t destroy the character development arcs. The characters have all visibly grown, it’s still bittersweet, and there is excitement for the future. No ship was made canon, no change of backstories, just the same movie, with a different ending.