Vanity Fair’s David Kamp recently tried to get Kathleen Kennedy and Rian Johnson to tell him the meaning behind The Last Jedi, the title of the upcoming Star Wars movie. LOL. Hopeless move, right? Why would he even ask such a question? Oh, because George Lucas told him who the The Phantom Menace referred to before that movie came out.
Vanity Fair: So, do we know what the words The Last Jedi allude to?
Kathleen Kennedy: Why in the world do you think I would tell you that?
VF: I’ll tell you why. Back in 1998, I interviewed George Lucas for V.F. ahead of The Phantom Menace, and I asked, “Who or what is the phantom menace?” And he nonchalantly said, “Oh, it’s Darth Sidious.”
KK: Did he really?
VF: Just like that.
KK: I’m not going to do that.
VF: So, does the word “Jedi” work in the singular or the plural?
KK: That’s actually what’s interesting about the title, and very intentionally ambiguous.
VF: As you’re being right now.
KK: Yes.
Here’s the relevant passage from a piece written by Kamp and published in 1999:
Given that The Phantom Menace is a Vader- and Emperor-free movie, the role of evil string-puller falls to someone we’ve never heard of. “The phantom menace is a character named Darth Sidious,” Lucas says, “who is the last of the Sith” (“An ancient people… conquered by powerful dark-side Jedi magic”-page 268, Star Wars Encyclopedia, by Stephen J. Sansweet). Actually, Lucas goes on to explain, the “menace” honorific should be broadened to include Sidious’s apprentice, Darth Maul, a terrifyingly fierce-looking character played by the martial-arts expert Ray Park. Maul gets to fight a lightsaber battle with Obi-Wan, but Sidious remains a shadowy figure. “Nobody knows Darth Sidious exists,” says Lucas. “Well, he’s seen to the audience, but not to the players.”
Lucas appears to be firmly in the spoilers are fine camp.
1. There are SPOILERS in this post. If you have not seen the movie, do not continue reading. I’ve only read one other review of the movie, so much of this may be stated elsewhere (and better) by others.
2. Overall, I enjoyed the movie. But thinking back to The Phantom Menace, I also enjoyed that quite a bit in the same spine-tingling way. But this movie is way better than the prequels were.
3. The cast was excellent and the casting progressive. I love that the two new protagonists are a black man and a woman. “Why are you grabbing my hand?”
4. Carrie Fisher’s voice has changed a lot. It suited her character.
5. By far the best part of the movie at the showing I went to didn’t appear on screen. I went to a matinee at 11am and the audience was mostly adults…probably 98% over the age of 30. When Rey uses the Force to persuade the Stormtrooper to release her, a little kid’s voice from the front row echoed out loudly across the entire theater: “Jedi mind trick”. The place exploded in laughter. A perfect comedic moment.
6. How many times are they going to keep making the same movie though? The plots of A New Hope, Return of the Jedi, and The Force Awakens are more or less the same: a small band of resistance fighters going up against an evil superpower headed by two practitioners in the Dark Side discover a weakness in the enemy’s planet-sized superweapon and destroy it with some X-wing fighters in the nick of time. Also: stolen plans in a droid, a young orphan discovering the ways of the Force, a trench run by a gifted young pilot to blow up the superweapon, a bailing-out of the X-wing fighters by the crew of the Millennium Falcon, sons/students striking down their fathers/masters, and so on. Is this part of the reason that Empire Strikes Back is considered the best of the series, because it’s different?
7. When Lucas made the first trilogy (and when he and Spielberg made Raiders of the Lost Ark), he constructed it from a bunch of different sources from when he was a kid and in film school. With The Force Awakens, JJ Abrams did the same thing, but instead of pulling from Flash Gordon and Kurosawa like Lucas did, he pulled from what he grew up with as a kid and in film school…Star Wars and Spielberg. In a way, The Force Awakens is a reboot of the original 1977 Star Wars, similar plot and all. And even if it isn’t a true reboot, it sure does rhyme.
8. Aside: when is the Empire/First Order going to learn not to put all of their eggs in one basket? Their superweapon strategy has failed three times now. They always seem to know where the rebels are hiding, they possess overwhelming force…why don’t they just defeat them through conventional means?
9. More synchronicity. When I watched the original Star Wars as an adult, one of the things I noticed is what a relatively minor character Vader is in the Empire when compared to his importance to the story and his increased power & responsibility in Empire and Jedi. He’s not in command, he’s not really part of the military at all, and the military leaders aren’t all that impressed with The Force. It’s almost almost like he’s the Emperor’s personal assistant. Kylo Ren’s role in The Force Awakens is similar…he’s not in charge (General Hux is), he’s not really part of the military (although he commands troops), and according to Snoke, Ren hasn’t even completed his training. (What was Vader’s excuse, then? He presumably completed his training long before the events of A New Hope…what was taking him so long to gain power?)
10. The scene at the very end bugged me. Having discovered the whereabouts of Luke Skywalker, the last of the Jedi, the Resistance sends Ren, Chewy, and R2 to see what’s up? I get the symbolism and all, but wouldn’t Leia be interested in seeing her brother again? Or more persuasive in getting him to come out of retirement?
11. We’re going to hear more about Rey’s parentage, right? She’s Luke’s daughter or something? (I’m guessing not. Waaay too obvious, even for Star Wars.)
12. Speaking of parentage, why is Snoke so big? So we’re not wondering if Rey is Snoke’s granddaughter or something? Or is it that Snoke’s hologram is big and he’s normal sized? (Wookiepedia says Snoke is 7 feet tall but doesn’t cite a source.)
13. If you liked this movie, you have to give the proper credit to George Lucas for allowing it to exist. He could have sat on this series until after his death and beyond. But he didn’t. He sold the whole shebang to Disney and trusted Kathleen Kennedy to make more movies.
14. Ok, Kennedy. Now I want to see Quentin Tarantino’s Star Wars. Wes Anderson’s Star Wars. Miranda July’s Star Wars. Seriously, do this. (I do not want to see Kevin Smith’s Star Wars. That one you can keep.)
15. All theaters should have assigned seating. I got the exact two seats I wanted (two months ahead of time) and showed up to the theater about 10 minutes before showtime, sat down, and the lights went down soon after. So much less stress than getting there 45 minutes (or 2 hours) beforehand and playing Are These Seats Taken? with strangers.
Update: 16. Does Han’s death scene reference the cantina scene w/ Greedo in Episode IV? He and Ren are both holding the lightsaber. Ren tells Han he needs to do something but doesn’t know if he can go through with it. Ren asks Han to help. The lightsaber activates and Han dies. Does Han activate the lightsaber, thereby causing his death? In other words, does Han shoot first? (Bonus update: I just saw the movie again and I don’t think Han activates the lightsaber. He looks too surprised and Ren definitely thrusts the saber into him.)
Update: 17. In his belated review, Chris Blattman notes the remarkable agreement on the lack of spoilers on social media:
Humanity’s tacit agreement to abide by a no-spoilers-on-social-media rule was one of the greatest acts of social cooperation I have witnessed. And we used it up to keep you from learning Han Solo is killed.
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