Of course. This trilogy of trilogies, this generational exploration of the galaxy through the lens of the Skywalker family, was always the plan (though Disney allowed Johnson and Abrams to change much of it, a lot of the core elements are still there...just worse).
Hasn't stopped them from making plenty of other material that doesn't focus on the Skywalkers so I don't know what you're taking issue with.
Of course the Skywalker saga needs Skywalkers. But Rey was never one of them, and she didn't "need" to be, though that may have been preferable to the mess that we actually got.Doesn't mean Rey or anyone else needs to be a Skywalker.
True, Luke having kids or not having kids wasn't the problem. I don't think anyone is saying otherwise.The problem with the sequels was Luke didn't actually do much of anything, not that he didn't have a girlfriend or daughter or whatever
"We all know the truth: more connects us than separates us. But in times of crisis the wise build bridges, while the foolish build barriers. We must find a way to look after one another, as if we were one single tribe."
~ Black Panther.
Well, once one of your main characters is a Skywalker, it’s going to be part of the story. Advertisements don’t really mean shit; once people saw Kylo was Ben Solo, it made the film another entry in the family story.
Which was why Rey either needed to be a Skywalker, or there needed to be some other off-ramp for the family story - like the non-Force Sensitive kid Ascended suggested.
People don’t like shitty endings for long term stories. The Skywalker story was a 6-film long one with an entire TV show before the ST even began. It either needed to be front and center but focused on the hero (Rey,) or diverted to the side but still with a satisfactory ending (a non-Force-using grandkid to counter Kylo.)
But once it was just Kylo, people were always going to screw over Rey for him. Hell, they immediately screwed over Finn for him, and I still hear crickets whenever that’s pointed out to TLJ fans.
Last edited by godisawesome; 10-16-2021 at 12:20 PM.
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What, Lucas always planning on three trilogies? It's true. This was a thing way back when Star Wars was nothing but three movies and a handful of comics, novels, and "behind the scenes/special feature" books. (as an aside, there's a novelization of the film's first draft, where Luke and Han were one character....it was a weird and fun read, if you can hunt it down).
Lucas never stops tinkering with his stories it seems, but the first version of the sequels that I recall hearing about (and my memory might be faulty here) had Luke and Leia rebuilding the Jedi and Republic, with Leia having children (twins it might've been?). A Palpatine clone unites the scattered Imperial remnants and tries to take down the New Republic, defeating Luke in the process. Unable to win, Luke starts to dabble in the dark side to gain enough power to defeat Palpatine 2.0, and almost gets corrupted before Leia saves him. They defeat Palpatine and credits roll.
I think Dark Horse did a rough adaptation of it as a comic miniseries, way back in the day. Never saw it though.
The most recent version of Lucas' sequels had Darth Maul take the place of the Palpatine clone, and unite the Imperial remnants with the crime syndicates. It would've still focused on Leia and her kids and the near-destruction of the fledgling Republic and Jedi Order. Not sure if Luke still would've fallen (however briefly) to the dark side or not. I think this was what Lucas was planning when he sold SW to Disney, so it would've been back in what, 2012 or something?
The Disney sequels obviously went their own way with things, but you can see some basic elements remained.
Anyway, yeah the point is that Star Wars was always supposed to be a generational tale about the Skywalkers, covering three generations across nine films. But feel free to give it a good Google if you don't trust my memory (might be wise).
Still don't get why you're so anti-Skywalker. Do we not have Clone Wars, Rebels, Mando, Rogue One, Solo, and a mountain of upcoming shows that don't feature the family name? Plus the Ewok movies we shouldn't speak of.![]()
"We all know the truth: more connects us than separates us. But in times of crisis the wise build bridges, while the foolish build barriers. We must find a way to look after one another, as if we were one single tribe."
~ Black Panther.
The original sequel trilogy planned by Lucas wasn't a clone of Palpatine(that didn't come up until Dark Empire) but rather the real one who because the original wasn't planned to be in Return of the Jedi, never mind die. The sequel trilogy was going to be Luke searching for his sister(who wasn't Leia) and then the two of them confronting the Emperor...but when Lucas started to get a little disillusioned by Star Wars he decided to wrap things up with Return of the Jedi which was when the Emperor became the big bad and Leia became his sister so that all the loose ends could be wrapped up in a single film.
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Yep. But, as pointed out, every third Trilogy idea he went over inevitably focused it on the Skywalker family again - because of course you would, as there’s not really any reason to have a “Part III” that isn’t about the same storyline form Parts I and II.
To the first part, it*is* true - provided you understand I’m making an argument, and thus it’s a subjective opinion backed up by evidence and logic, of course. It’s no coincidence that LFL steadily but consistently focused more on Kylo Ren for expanded Universe material and in terms of studio priorities in making Episode IX, or that even though TLJ is utter crap in regards to Kylo and Rey, Kylo’s fans remained steadfast and confident they would be pandered to… and were. Kylo being the only new Skywalker meant the audience automatically cared more about him than it did the other characters, as it did for the studio - because no one wanted a crap ending for the family, even if they guaranteed it by making Kylo the only new member. And that’s a big part of the reason the audience was cut in half from the first of the ST to the last - a huge chunk dropped out and stopped caring once they saw they’d have to care about Diet Darth Vader to see any actual sequel to Anakin and Luke’s story.
As to the second, oh yeah, Finn definitely got screwed over by the screwed up Skywalker story as well as studio politics. Because they were one and the same; you can’t separate the racism Boyega was confronted with from the easy excuse that Kylo being the only new Skywalker gave to those racists, and to the people it would have brought to ally with them, in demeaning Finn. They were willing to prostitute Rey’s characterization out for Kylo when she wasn’t a Skywalker - what defense would the guy occupying the spot LFL wanted for Kylo have?
For every person who consciously or unconsciously decided that Star Wars wasn’t ready for a Black Male lead or a Black Male love interest, there was someone who just automatically wanted to focus on the new Skywalker character because why bother to make a Sequel Trilogy to the story ft he Skywalkers if they weren’t front and center?
And hell, all those people who claimed that Rey would be more interesting by not being a Skywalker either ignored or chose to ignore that Finn was already proving that point - partially because they also wanted a Skywalker to still keep pride of place in the story, and that shoved Rey into Finn’s spot as the audience insert characters, kicking him down to minor character.
Now, that may not be how *you* work… but that's how people work. Once Kylo had a monopoly on the Skywalker legacy, everyone else was screwed a little bit.
Like action, adventure, rogues, and outlaws? Like anti-heroes, femme fatales, mysteries and thrillers?
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I understand your argument. I don't agree. You're basically saying Disney has to capitulate to biases in the audience. No offense but that's nonsense.
Actually, it’s not that they have to capitulate, but instead acknowledge and maneuver around biases - primarily because, at the end of the day this is a pop-culture franchise, where satisfying the most people, even if it’s not exactly with what they’re expected, should be the main goal. You must avoid the “Shoot The Shaggy Dog” effect - where the audience will feel like they have been insultingly mocked and conned into watching an unlikeable story that will begrudge them storyteller for - but you can tell almost any story if you react to the psychology of the audience to get there.
It’s like Game of Thrones - at the height of its success, it could do almost anything because it had the right mix of unpredictability plus intelligent and satisfying construction… but when they had to wrap it up and only had a rough bullet point of “Dany goes evil, gets killed by Jon” they just didn’t have the time or intelligence to really pull it off, and trashed the ending. There, a better understanding of the audience’s psychology - what objections they would raise, what arguments would work against those objections, what compensations they would accept, etc. - would have shown them how to better illustrate Dany’s motivations and perspectives to feel like a Red Wedding-esque Tragedy, rather than a pointless swerve that wasted the audience’s time.
With the Skywalkers in the ST, understanding the audience’s psychology could do anything like these three concepts:
- Rey is a Skywalker; she’s Luke’s daughter, Finn is the Everyman hero and her love interest, and Ben Solo could survive the story in exile. It’s the easiest option, both in terms of implementation and maintaining quality control - you’re much more likely to successfully satisfy the largest amount of people.
- Rey isn’t a Skywalker, she *is* the Everyman hero, but so is Finn, who likely remains her love interest, and Kylo Ren remains a loathesome monster designed to repel audience hope that he’s the new hero based off his lineage… but a new sister or cousin character to Ben Solo provides an off-ramp to audience expectations. This is more difficult, but not by that much - with the off-ramp, you can more easily fend off biases from helping Kylo.
- Rey isn’t a Skywalker, she and Finn are the main characters, there is no off-ramp Skywalker kid… but the story is written to at all times consciously fight audience objections by addressing them. There are clear and explicit message about anti-elitism that are applied equally, there’s a clear and explicit “found family” story designed for Rey to be integrated into the family, Kylo,is used to deconstruct the family story’s prioritization without any favoritism towards him, and most importantly you figure out what will allow fans fo the family to leave satisfied with the ending. This is going to be difficult, and you’re going to be fighting your own creators and fanbase… but it’s the kind fo thing that, if you do it right, can be pulled off the same way Game of Thrones could kill off multiple protagonists and antagonist through non-central conflicts.
What you can’t do is a “whatever the hell I want however the hell I want.” One or the other must mai ever with audience expectations.
It’s like how you can’t just have Superman become a serial killer, or have Batman fall in love with the Joker, or have the Federation order the Enterprise to commit genocide, or have Professor X revealed to be imbezzling funds from his school. In theory, those are options you could use, but they are options you shouldn’t use just for kicks, and should only deploy with clever writing that acknowledged what the audience is thinking, however it gets there.
No one wanted the Skywalker family story to become a waste of time. So however it got continued in the ST, they had to make sure it didn’t come off as thoughtless, wastefully capricious idiocy. There were more than one way to do that, but the simplest and most effective - and likely the most profitable because it gives you more story idea - would have been to make sure the family keeps on existing.
Like action, adventure, rogues, and outlaws? Like anti-heroes, femme fatales, mysteries and thrillers?
I wrote a book with them. Outlaw’s Shadow: A Sherwood Noir. Robin Hood’s evil counterpart, Guy of Gisbourne, is the main character. Feel free to give it a look: https://read.amazon.com/kp/embed?asi...E2PKBNJFH76GQP
But that's not correct. The audience would've probably liked Rey if she had more thorough characterization. And the comparison with Superman, for instance, is weak because Rey isn't a pre-existing character. Just make Rey a more interesting character and the audience will probably like it. You're acting like the audience is sure to not like it but that's not really true
Ohh, intriguing. I figured the first version of the sequels I came across wasn't the original original version (which I hope I made clear earlier), but I didn't know the version I had heard of deviated that far from the first iteration.
How certain are you that this was the original plan and where did you find it? I did a super quick google last night (taking my own advice) but all I saw were references to Lucas' latest plan (the one that included Maul). But that was just a quick search, virtually useless.
In any case, my point stands that Lucas always intended for the story to revolve around the Skywalkers.
This is actually a tricky proposition. A creator doesn't "have" to take their audience into account....but it's wise if they do. Even if the plan is to go against expectations and give people something they didn't know they wanted, or invert expectations, or whatever....you gotta consider how audiences will react to it.I understand your argument. I don't agree. You're basically saying Disney has to capitulate to biases in the audience. No offense but that's nonsense.
I spent several years as a graphic artist and I learned real early on that you need to honor your own creative impulses; those are what get you hired in the first place. But you also have to curb and shape those impulses to fit the project and intended audience. I got kicked off one of my earliest gigs because I wanted to do my art my way, without considering how it fit around the project I was hired onto. Losing that paycheck was a powerful lesson.
And just to point out, it feels a lot like Johnson did "whatever the hell he wanted" with Last Jedi, and the reaction to that film speaks for itself. Maybe he considered these things and just inverted the wrong stuff and played to the wrong expectations, who knows, but in any case he greatly misjudged (or ignored) the attachment fans have to Luke and the Skywalker legacy and it's caused major problems ever since.
Just watched a "making of Mando" featurette on Disney+ the other day where Jon Faverau (spelling?) talks about this exact thing and how it relates to Luke's cameo in the finale. Might be worth a watch.
Last edited by Ascended; 10-17-2021 at 11:54 AM.
"We all know the truth: more connects us than separates us. But in times of crisis the wise build bridges, while the foolish build barriers. We must find a way to look after one another, as if we were one single tribe."
~ Black Panther.
I think in the original plan Episode VI was going to be a lot darker-Han would die, Vader would die but the Rebellion would still be in a bad place at the end.
Kind of fits with what Yoda said in ESB about Luke rescuing Han and Leia would destroy all for what they fought for.
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Rian Johnson doing what he wanted and not working out doesn't preclude anyone else
For Rey by herself, you’re right - in fact, one of the reasons I’d argue TFA is clearly a good Star Wars film is because they made sure she was a thoroughly characterized main character… and made her a pre-existing character when Rian Johnson screwed her up. She’s a victim of The Ben Solo Obsession as well.
But for the Skywalker family story… you’re wrong. Because then, of course, it’s a separate story from Rey, and Kylo can’t carry it to a good ending by himself. It’s why some satisfactory answer for them needs to be come up with, because Kylo can’t do it - unless someone takes over for him there, or the story needs to contort itself to try and minimize the damage his existence does to the family story.
Maybe the better comparison would be how Flash fans would feel if Heroes in Crisis through in a death for Barry, Bart, and the rest of the family, while subtracting Wally’s heroic past, all so someone else can be the new speedster. Or just like how Hal Jordan fans felt when Emerald Twilight happened.
Like action, adventure, rogues, and outlaws? Like anti-heroes, femme fatales, mysteries and thrillers?
I wrote a book with them. Outlaw’s Shadow: A Sherwood Noir. Robin Hood’s evil counterpart, Guy of Gisbourne, is the main character. Feel free to give it a look: https://read.amazon.com/kp/embed?asi...E2PKBNJFH76GQP