The Force Awakens vs The Last Jedi

[godisawesome]

Okay, my buddy and I did a whole podcast over this idea: https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/...=2&i=408109126

For the record, we both think both films are good, it's just a matter of which one we think so better; he sees TLJ as much greater, whereas I tend to find TLJ a rather signicance disappointment as a sequel to TFA.

So, vote, maybe give your reasons, and discuss.

(And maybe download the podcast?)

[Carabas]

The Force Awakens is an unashamed crowd pleaser.
But The Last Jedi is a better film that aims higher IMO.

[sunofdarkchild]

TFA is a remake of ANH which basically undoes everything accomplished in the og trilogy. It is very good until the third act when the whole thing falls apart.

TLJ is an original film which takes risks and plays with themes. Its middle act is uneven because of the casino subplot but its final act is good.

Overall I'd give it to TLJ for being much more original and for not dropping off a cliff in quality the moment Kylo Ren takes off his mask.

[Soubhagya]

I love both the films but i think The Last Jedi is much better.

TFA is great. It introduces new characters, new worlds and the conflict really well. A true crowd pleaser which reminded me why Star Wars was so great in the first place. I don't subscribe to the notion that it is A New Hope. There are similarities for sure. But not so much in my opinion. And if there are a number of similarities its well and good. After Return of The Jedi we needed that Star Wars feeling which was missing in the prequels. I loved the film. It has a couple of advantages over the TLJ. It is more plot driven and somewhat tighter in my opinion. Love the new characters as well as their interactions. While characters were there, they were separated for most of TLJ.


TLJ is better. It does what a sequel shall do. Build upon the foundation of the first and try something more. Its a class act in juggling characters in my opinion. Characters old and new went through stories of their own and were developed while making the story move forward really satisfactorily. Poe learns to be more mature and is on road to be a leader. Finn becomes a true rebel. Rey comes to terms with her past on her path to be the hero of the story. Leia gets a meatier role as she leads the ragtag group of rebels while passing the torch. Kylo turns into a really compelling character and a first rate villain. Luke undergoes a really amazing character arc. And Rose just might be my new favorite character in Star Wars. I love her. The film goes through so many twists and turns making it fresh while opening up wonderful possibilities for future films. There are some breathtaking scenes on par with the originals. I simply adore this film.

I think the X-factor is Luke's story arc. It was similar to another great film Logan. And its the best film for fans contrary to what others think. The one character who says let the past die is beaten to unconsciousness, fooled and ends up all alone by the end. He is shown his place by what is essentially the motion picture of Luke Skywalker whose 'idea' is enough to inspire the future heroes.





I want to post this one. The film is really beautiful.

[David Walton]

I think the X-factor is Luke's story arc. It was similar to another great film Logan. And its the best film for fans contrary to what others think. The one character who says let the past die is beaten to unconsciousness, fooled and ends up all alone by the end. He is shown his place by what is essentially the motion picture of Luke Skywalker whose 'idea' is enough to inspire the future hero.

Agreed. I think the biggest misconception about TLJ, shared by fans and critics alike, is that Kylo's philosophy is also the film's.

Luke's character arc mirrors Kylo's in a lot of ways. He, too, thinks he needs to 'let the past die' even though he can't quite bring himself to kill it. Kylo lashes out at his perceived links to the past while Luke just tries to quarantine the Jedi ways from the outside world and let them fade away. Yoda's final lesson is that past never really dies nor should it. Luke needs to let go of the sacred texts (to allow his student to transcend him) while Rey needs to reclaim them for the next generation.

[Jokerz79]

I don't find either too great but I walked out of Force Awakens wanting to spend more time with the characters it introduced and never wanted to see the characters The Last Jedi introduced ever again so I give the upper hand to Force Awakens.

[godisawesome]

TFA is a remake of ANH which basically undoes everything accomplished in the og trilogy. It is very good until the third act when the whole thing falls apart.

TLJ is an original film which takes risks and plays with themes. Its middle act is uneven because of the casino subplot but its final act is good.

Overall I'd give it to TLJ for being much more original and for not dropping off a cliff in quality the moment Kylo Ren takes off his mask.

I don't think TLJ can actually be called all that original; as covered in the podcast in my signature (sorry, got to plug it!), TLJ's meta-narrative is by and large just a less interesting and much less logically consistent version of the pursuit of the Falcon in ESB, with a Hoth style epilogue, and the film is ruthlessly dogmatic in pursuing the OT's political and military situation in a very disappointing way.

The Space Chase falls apart in logic when you realize that there's no good reason for Hux and the First Order to not sacrifice an acceptable (even by good guy standards) number of TIEs against an unshielded front of the Raddus to bring it down, or jump in front of the Resistance fleet if Rey and Finn can do that, and that's without pointing out how stupid it is for the FO to not have some kind of intermediate ship capable of catching them. The Resistance plan to evade the FO is also stupid, neglecting to account for the astounding power of logic, since apparently they expect the FO not to notice the 18 hour chase has led them to a planet, or to look out their windows and see the escaping transports, since the film doesn't establish a visual-component to the cloaking excuse.

And it's compounded by schizophrenic and manipulative writing of Holdo and an refusal to setup the hyperspace ram, both of which render the Space Chase juvenile even in its ending. Holdo is apparently supposed to be a compenttn commander who relies on discipline and the chain of command to command her crew, but does nothing when Poe challenges her loyalty and competenc eon her bridge, just so that Rian Johnson can have the audience think Poe's reasonable for a bit, before he tries to ignore the mistake he just had her make in order to suddenly make her a reasonable authority figure. He's written a commander who lost control of her crew because of her own inconsistency, but wants her to be a paragon of command. And since he doesn't set up the shield-ignoring hyoseprcae ram, we're forced to consider everyone involved in the film, if not the entire saga, as stupid for not just using hyperspace weapons every single space battle. We could have used the heroes on the Supremacy to set it up, but that would have required having Finn and Rise have some actual significance to the main plot, and we can't have that, can we?

And the film really wants people to ignore the logical outcome of TFA in regards to politics; there's no way the FO should be unopposed in their conquest of the Galaxy save for the Resistance. The New Republic was bigger than the Hosnian System, the Wookies ain't going to be enslaved again, the Mon Cala are just going to launch their skyscraper/ships into space again, and the literally millions of Galactic Civil War veterans who are still alive are going to get involved. Pretending like the Galaxy's a small place just to try and make the Resisatnce become the Rebllion again is insultingly stupid.

[Serpico Jones]

They’re both mediocre. Force Awakens is better because it’s shorter and the characters pop more...but it’s largely a rehash of the first film and it’s helmed by a visionless studio hack. The second film is too long and often boring with uninteresting characters. The second film was directed by a 25 cent indie stooge/puppet.

[Soubhagya]

I don't think TLJ can actually be called all that original; as covered in the podcast in my signature (sorry, got to plug it!), TLJ's meta-narrative is by and large just a less interesting and much less logically consistent version of the pursuit of the Falcon in ESB, with a Hoth style epilogue, and the film is ruthlessly dogmatic in pursuing the OT's political and military situation in a very disappointing way.

The Space Chase falls apart in logic when you realize that there's no good reason for Hux and the First Order to not sacrifice an acceptable (even by good guy standards) number of TIEs against an unshielded front of the Raddus to bring it down, or jump in front of the Resistance fleet if Rey and Finn can do that, and that's without pointing out how stupid it is for the FO to not have some kind of intermediate ship capable of catching them. The Resistance plan to evade the FO is also stupid, neglecting to account for the astounding power of logic, since apparently they expect the FO not to notice the 18 hour chase has led them to a planet, or to look out their windows and see the escaping transports, since the film doesn't establish a visual-component to the cloaking excuse.

And it's compounded by schizophrenic and manipulative writing of Holdo and an refusal to setup the hyperspace ram, both of which render the Space Chase juvenile even in its ending. Holdo is apparently supposed to be a compenttn commander who relies on discipline and the chain of command to command her crew, but does nothing when Poe challenges her loyalty and competenc eon her bridge, just so that Rian Johnson can have the audience think Poe's reasonable for a bit, before he tries to ignore the mistake he just had her make in order to suddenly make her a reasonable authority figure. He's written a commander who lost control of her crew because of her own inconsistency, but wants her to be a paragon of command. And since he doesn't set up the shield-ignoring hyoseprcae ram, we're forced to consider everyone involved in the film, if not the entire saga, as stupid for not just using hyperspace weapons every single space battle. We could have used the heroes on the Supremacy to set it up, but that would have required having Finn and Rise have some actual significance to the main plot, and we can't have that, can we?

And the film really wants people to ignore the logical outcome of TFA in regards to politics; there's no way the FO should be unopposed in their conquest of the Galaxy save for the Resistance. The New Republic was bigger than the Hosnian System, the Wookies ain't going to be enslaved again, the Mon Cala are just going to launch their skyscraper/ships into space again, and the literally millions of Galactic Civil War veterans who are still alive are going to get involved. Pretending like the Galaxy's a small place just to try and make the Resisatnce become the Rebllion again is insultingly stupid.

I will try to say something.

Do we need to visually see cloaking? Earlier it was mentioned by DJ as they approached the main ship and were undetected. I think it works, though people can be confused. Its only two lines in the whole film.

You make a good point that it is not really a good military tactic to stop attacking the front side as they are out of range of the canons. The film does not give any reason. I guessed that could be because they lost a lot of manpower and resources after Starkiller blew up. As well as the Dreadnought. But that's speculation on my part. The film does not explain anything about this tactic. How FO were so concerned for the safety of their own force? I just say that there is no need for trying something else. Why risk people or ships when all they had to do was chase for a few hours and the rebellion would perish.

Not a very satisfactory explanation, but films don't have the best military plans and logic. In New Hope, Leia goes with the plans with knowledge that the empire left them off. In Return of The Jedi, Luke's plan to save Solo made no sense if we think about it. Or the Empire would make another Death Star and this time its shield would be on the ground in the middle of a forest. The easiest way to blow up the shield is you don't get to the ground. With your ship attack from the top and destroy the shield. They also went in with a stolen vessel. And somehow torturing Luke before Vader was a good idea on the part of the Emperor. In Phantom Menace, the death of Darth Maul is absolutely foolish. After being awesome and killing Qui Gon and leaving Obi Wan hanging on the edge, Darth Maul simply waits instead of going for the kill. To analyze films like this is fruitless in my opinion. Even in the best films we get lapses of logic. Even true greats like Godfather Part 2 are not completely free of it. (Towards the end there is an assassination attempt. While the film shows there is a chain of command, and lower rung gangsters carry out the hits, a right hand guy of Godfather carries out a particularly risky hit for no reason and dies. That's in character but really poor planning). First Order did not want to risk more men and ships. That's good enough.

And coming near a planet is not a problem. Loosing the ship was a big deal. That's the last main ship of the resistance. Crait was an abandoned base from the days of the rebellion. There's no reason for FO to know that a base existed. Without the ship rebels were depending on help from outer rim. So, it was unexpected on their part. Without the base, getting into another planet by abandoning the ship is actually quite far fetched from the point of view of the FO.

So, what do you suggest Poe should have done to Poe after Poe challenges her on the bridge? She asked the others to take him away from the bridge. I don't fully understand that paragraph. She did not loose control of her command over her crew. Only a handful of people turned against here. The situation got to normal too quickly. Hyperspace Ram does not really work without allowing lots of losses. A big ship like the rebel's did not fully damage the main ships of the FO. A lot of people survived on those ships. Plus, you loose your ship. And people can detect when they are preparing for light speed. Hux knew her ship was turning. But he ignored that. He could have asked the people to stop attacking the escaping rebels and attack on the ship. But he did not think that the ship was turning towards them. Before he could realize what Holdo was doing it was late. Or else the ship could have been shot down. It worked for that instance. But can groups like rebellion who are shorter on men and resources afford to loose ships for this tactic. Seems like a lot of waste for limited results.

The entire New Republic was destroyed. And FO was not fully unopposed. The Resistance were a small band. But they had allies on the outer rim who did not arrive to help. There were people who would join them if they survived in the first place.

[sirmarkus]

Overall I'd give it to TLJ for being much more original and for not dropping off a cliff in quality the moment Kylo Ren takes off his mask.

I thought that was where Kylo really started to come into his own.

[David Walton]

I find it really hard to compare SW films.

Comparing TFA to TLJ is a lot like comparing ANH to ESB. They're so different tonally that I'm not sure how you'd honestly say which is better. It depends on what you're looking for.

TFA, like ANH, is more energetic and open-ended.

TLJ, like ESB, is more character-based and thought-provoking.

Both, I think, accomplish what they intend to.

[Scott Taylor]

TLJ was the more interesting narrative, but I found it to be a boring film. Most of that, for me, is that the stakes felt very small for a Star Wars movie. The First Order didn't really feel like a galactic-level threat. And the Rebellion seemed hopelessly disorganized.

I guess on the good side of things, the galaxy should be nice and safe for a good long while.

[motherofpearl1]

The Force Awakens is an unashamed crowd pleaser.
But The Last Jedi is a better film that aims higher IMO.

Yes. I really enjoyed The Force Awakens. But The Last Jedi boldly went where no Star Wars film has. Many hated it. But I loved it.