oh yeah he does. I wonder what i said about that in my long writeup.

evidently nothing...

That’s the moment he becomes a Jedi. Only when he faces Vader and rejects the dark side.

i like that scene too. her mom, though...

Perhaps. He does act like a Jedi even at the beginning of the movie though. When he arrives at Jabba’s palace.

...wha?

So how do Leia and Han find out that Ben has turned to the dark side and destroyed the academy?
Han in TFA knows and doesn’t seem to hold it against him and blames Ben, but it doesn’t look like Leias seen or heard from him since before it happened, hence the apology in TLJ.

Did he run away from even that much responsibility?

she abandons jyn to die for her principles. a fundamentally selfish act. i wish R1 explored the impact this had on jyn

Oh yeah. Odd that. She’s not really painted as a rebel in the catalyst book either I don’t think. I could be wrong.

AL

Hmm. I don’t think I agree this is fundamentally selfish. I think you could argue the opposite is true, actually.

The mother doesn’t really make sense to me. She sends Jyn to hide then almost immediately gets herself shot on purpose. In a real scenario you’d be playing by for time to give the kid time to get away. Galens all but giving in to Krennic even before she does that. Futile gesture getting herself killed for it.

You could argue it to child services for sure

I don't think the Empire had DSS, stip

I agree. Clearly her odds were poor, but she did it to save her husband and kid. She probably thought that if she killed Krennic, they would have a good chance of surviving.

All the ruckus it created may even have saved Jyn in the end.

But going in with one gun against several soldiers against her husbands wishes, when he was basically surrendering without any gun, was foolish.

I saw The Last Jedi for the second time in a cinema yesterday. I am still more or less in the same frame of mind about the movie. It has several flaws, yet it also entertains. There are certainly parts I wish were different, nevertheless it's all canon now.

In the first scene the resistance evacuates their base, after being discovered by The First Order. We have Poe facing a dreadnought on his own, prank calling Hux, and terribly slow and poorly defended bombers heading towards the big ship. While surely there are possibilities of being criticial of this, I found it all very effective. All three times I have seen it, I have been been fully engaged in the scene. We have the story going further, we have a beautiful space battle, Leia and Poe arguing over orders, a dreadnought being destroyed, loss of a named rebel hero. It's a good start. Then The First Order pursues through light speed, we get Finn being stunned by Rose (funny scene), and eventually them and Poe coming up with a plan to stop the light speed tracking. I couldn't really fault anything this far, and I always have a good feeling at this point. It reminds me a bit of the start of TPM.

We then arrive at Ahch-To. I am more at peace with the beginning of this. It's Luke acting a bit like Yoda did when they first met. We have the scene with Chewie knocking down the door, and Luke finally teaching Rey. There are some good scenes here, but it's overshadowed for me by a weak acting performance from Daisy Ridley, and a Luke I struggle to believe in. He has shut himself off from the force and wants the Jedi to end. I loved the parts with the flashbacks of Luke and Kylo. They were done perfectly. I can appreciate the link between Kylo and Rey better now, even if I wish it was directed slightly differently. Similar events were more powerful in previous movies, without the two seeing or touching each other. The humor falls a bit flat, "can you please put a shirt on". Rey finally leaves to confront Kylo, and only after first confronting Luke in a really good scene. The best parts of Ahch-To were any scene with Mark Hamill/Luke, and especially him sharing his knowledge and his views (apart from the Jedi must end stuff).

Then Leia is blown into space and does a space flight using the force. She is the daughter of Anakin Skywalker, and I see nothing wrong with it. I am happy we got the scenes with her, and I think she did a stellar job. We then have a mutiny from Poe against the rebellion's temporary leader Holdo. Poe seemed to fail the throughout the movie, but I thought the mutiny part was entertaining. He is eventually stunned (shot) by Leia. Meanwhile, Finn and Rose have travelled to Canto Bight. These scenes were worse this time around. Both the politicial agenda talk, the imprisonment, the little kids, the escape with the animals, none of it was good. It looked good, but it felt like a tear in the movie. At least it introduced us to DJ, with an exellent actor.

There are two really popular scenes in this movie that I am not a big fan of, and they are fairly close to each other. The first is the Yoda scene. I think it feels forced. I don't mind that we got Yoda, but I wish it had been executed differently. Him burning the tree and all that stuff about the Jedi ending, not a fan. The other popular scene I didn't fully appreciate, is a litle bit later. Snoke is killed, in a bit of an anticlimax, but a still interesting twist to the story. I don't mind that now, although I think Snoke was a poor character (much worse than the Emperor from the OT). Kylo and Ren then team up to beat his guards. But the whole battle feels more like a dance, and at no point will anyone ever think the two are in actual danger. The red men themselves are without any personality or background, just red shirts ready to die.

After evacating the other rebels, Holdo fires her ship in light speed straight at the main First Order ship. It's a great scene. Beautiful even. Finn and Rose were in dire straits when this happened, as they were about to be executed, and were surrounded by hundreds of troops (at least). However, after the explosion on that very ship, not only are they fine, they are basically alone. Shortly afterwards Phasma attacks with some men to help her, and BB8 contributes by killing a lot. Then only Finn and Phasma fight, and she falls to her death. Finn and Rose escape to safety, and flies to the rebellion. Not much to say, other than that these scenes are not top tier Star Wars.

The Battle of Crait is good. Luke appears as a hologram, and tricks Kylo. This wasn't perfect, but it was satisfactory and clever. The scenes are beautiful, and provides a nice ending. Rey helps the rebels escape, while Luke fades into oblivion on Ahch-To, while staring a twin suns. A little boy on Canto Bight dreams of Luke, and uses the force to pick up his broom. Good ending, even if I wanted more Luke.

SO perfect

I did wonder about Luke’s metal hand when he died.

I don't know if force-choking guys to death is very Jedi-like.

Saber drop