Finn's story arc appears to be written to turn him from a coward who only wants to run from the Empire First Order, to a Rebel Resistance fighter who wants to fight "for the things he loves". Decent premise that falls on its face because it takes up the entire second act/middle of the film and it's completely pointless to the overarching narrative. All it does is set up a few cheap scenes that have no real payoff for any of the characters involved: -Who is the codebreaker? Who cares, here's some random character instead, but you shouldn't trust him because he's gonna betray ya! Yep he does oh well you messed everything up. **** you Maz for sending us here -Is Finn actually gonna have some character development? Nope, he gets saved by some girl he just met who suddenly loves him now -Who is Rose? Who cares she dies...no wait she has to hang around because Reylo ship is happening and a love triangle would make things awkward -Who is Phasma? Toys. Phasma is Toys Then you have Luke - the established character - who is easily bested by Rey Sue and reduced to a shadow of his former self, almost as if there weren't already 3 movies that showed him grow into a good character. Nope, let's throw that out the window to make Rey Sue look better. And there's Emo "I wanna be like grandad but suck at it" Ren, who is also bested by Rey Sue after a series of scenes written entirely to appeal to the tumblr shipping crowd. Kylo is - at best - a decent character who is rather obviously portrayed as a tortured soul. His arc is held back only because he is filling the role of someone who has traditionally been more intimidating in Star Wars. On the other hand, Rey hasn't earned the audience's investment because she doesn't earn any scene she is in - it's simply handed to her. That is the epitome of wish fulfillment, which is one of the biggest mistakes in fan fiction. Because the whole trilogy revolves around Rey, and pretty much every character's actions lead back to Rey in one form or another, and because Rey has not earned that position due to how effortlessly she overcomes every obstacle thrown at her, it earns the poor fanfiction label. That's EXACTLY what amateur writers do when they create new characters in established franchises, and Rey is no different. That's not even mentioning characters like Poe and Hux, who are walking cliches. The sad part is that it's a watchable movie because it's decently made and interesting enough to give you some new eye candy before you have time to notice how stupid it is. For me, I was literally in the theater halfway through the movie wishing I was watching Rogue One instead. When the lore involves reskinning the Empire into the First Order, the Rebellion into the Resistance, all of the ships into slightly different looking versions of the previous ships, and the whole "fighting for what's right" storyline gets regurgitated all over again, all the film has left for it are its characters. And these characters are DOG.
You are assuming Rey is the center of it all when in fact it's the Rey/Kylo Dynamic. So yes, when you ignore one and only focus on the other they will have missing pieces. I'm not saying this excuses her of any uninspiring scenes, I personally don't like Daisey Ridley that much as an actress. Luke gave up on the force years before Rey found him. He put effort into forgeting the force entirely so its not at all unreasonable for Rey to best a crippled old hermit who lost his power. Also I'm not entirely sure why the force needs to be earned... Anakin was literally a slave child who tought himself to use the force which in turn made him one of the best pilots ever at the age of 9 - no formal jedi training needed. The force isnt monopolized by the skywalker family so its makes complete sense why any living being can be gifted with it. This movie made it expecially clear how little control Rey has over her powers. During the fight in the Throne room Kylo is effortlessly beating 3 knight's while Rey nearly gets killed by one. Even in Force Awakens it was never Snokes or Kylos intent to kill Rey, that's why she "won" during there enconters. They wanted to turn her to the dark side because they recognized her potental. It just seems like most of the complaints about the protagonists are derived from the lack of validation given to people who created there own personal head canon built off of unconfirmed fan theories and old extended universe lore. I do despise Rose in this movie though. She should have let Fin sacrafice himself in the cannon, instead she "rescued" him because of love. My eyes almost roled out of there sockets during that shot. Waste of screen time and her motive was lame as ****. I'd bet money she was put in to fill a diversity quota.
My rule of thumb is that if it takes that ^ level of analysis to justify writing or character behavior in something... There's probably something off. Even if all that were true about the force not needing to be earned, if most people's initial impressions of something is "Well that was weird", then it's probably poorly written. It kinda takes you out of the entire experience and universe any time you come across a moment like that which defeats the entire purpose of the medium, even if you can sit there and explain it away.
The Force Awakening refers to Rey The Last Jedi refers to Rey The light/dark balance between Rey and Kylo Ren (which is a stupid fanfic name too, smh) is obviously there, which I mentioned, but because Rey is so poorly written, it doesn't go anywhere. That's a poor canonical justification for Rey being overpowered That part of the prequels was stupid too - Lucas could have come up with a more convincing way to have the council take Anakin from Tattooine, but at least we saw him Podracing before we saw him piloting a Starship, just like we heard Luke bullseye womprats before he got in an Xwing. So what was Rey doing before she was walking all over Kylo and Luke and Snoke's guards? Dumpster diving and beating a few thugs with a stick. Okay. Your job as a writer is to establish a clear set of rules for the audience. Star Wars basically has no rules anymore, but a good writer will make you believe they're still there. Easy way to do that? Have Luke completely **** on Rey, because some girl who has had no formal training should not overpower a Jedi Master that has already been established as strong just because he's disgruntled and "not using the Force" and she's "so powerful". Even without all the expanded universe stuff, he was already shown to have more experience than her. EVEN IF she is more powerful than Luke, why would you write your new character into a film and have them show up an established character in such a way? What does it do for Rey's character? Nothing. That's why nobody cares how strong she is in the force in the first place. It's such a stupid plot device because without any relatable conflict, it's noise. THAT is the center of the problem with Rey. Her only character "flaw" is her attachment to her parents or anyone who resembles her parents, and she has barely struggled with this after two movies. Without the ability to relate, it's like watching someone play the entirety of Super Mario with the invincibility star mod. No, it made it clear that Rey can use the Force at will, wield a Lightsaber with no training against Snoke's PERSONAL GUARDS (whoever the **** Snoke is), and still show up Kylo in the process. Because she's "special". She's "afraid of some force that has woken inside her." WHEN IS SHE EVER SHOWN BEING AFRAID OF IT? WHEN IS SHE EVER SHOWN STRUGGLING TO USE IT? Never Ah yes, the typical TLJ apologist angle. "Everyone has their own head canon." I'm not even invested in the Star Wars lore and my reaction to the movie has consistently been "This is poorly written." A writer should create a story that makes sense on its own, not write lore to explain why it doesn't make sense. Why does X suddenly get new powers? Because she accumulated enough Y and earned Z back - whatever I don't care. What does it do for their character? That's the question. It would be like Optimus Prime suddenly being being able to transform into an Xbox One, and then John Turturro's character showing up to tell the audience that he installed the latest Microsoft OS between movies. And we're supposed to just sit back and say "Oh okay, that's fine!" What does it do for him? I'm obviously salted because Star Wars is a big part of why I wanted to go into filmmaking. Watching the fanbase **** on Lucas until he gave up Star Wars to Disney, who then cancelled the amazing Clone Wars series and replaced it with Rebelturds and a DOG trilogy... it's a shame. Perfect example of living long enough to see yourself become the villain.
This Star Wars **** is too juicy for me to miss out on, I wish I had my computer on me @Ascend Hyperion your link will arrive shortly (20 minutes) - map is not complete, needs some serious rebalancing on he weapons front as of rn
If you want to see Multis next map, just close your eyes. You dont have to envision it, youre looking at it.
If you want to see xzamplez's new map, just look at the room you're sitting in inb4 if you want to see goat's new map, look in the trash (this is lowkey a good thread idea i'm mad i didn't think of it)
If you want to see my new map, who do you think you are? No one wants to see this ****. Anyway here it is, my race map for the contest, working title (race):