Film Star Wars Episode IX The Rise of Skywalker [Theories]

Parma Dewol

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Finally mustered up the courage to watch this again. Unfortunately, it didn't improve a second time around.

The whole film is somehow lacking in Star Wars magic. I can only imagine how difficult is to make a great movie on this scale - so much has to come together, from so many people, and you wonder if a fair amount of luck is involved - yet when I'm watching Rise of Skywalker, I just feel sad that the new trilogy didn't manage to capture the imagination. Maybe it was overly optimistic to ever hope that the new films could rekindle the magnetism of the originals.

After the film finished I had to go to YouTube to watch a couple of clips from Empire, just to and remind myself how amazing Star Wars can be.
 

decorativeed

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It was too up it's own arse with political correctness and the characters were all boring
I didn't think there was anything 'politically correct' about it. What I thought the issues actually were centers on having far too many characters, introducing even more of them in the last part, no compelling story arcs, bottling the challenge of doing anything new by continuing the interesting bits from Last Jedi and bringing the Emperor back instead. Also having the main character, Rey, portrayed by someone with zero acting ability didn't help. Imagine spending the best part of a billion dollars to produce three films that nobody had bothered to write a coherent new story for at the start of the process.
 

Sylar

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They didn't have a plan for Rey going into the last movie! :lol:
They kinda didnt have a plan for her going into the second movie either.
ill never understand hiring different directors and letting them decide the how the story goes (thus that middle we had)
 

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I am a big fan of universe building in Star Wars so there was no rescuing this trilogy for me once it became clear that they pulled Snoke out of their ass instead of giving him an actual backstory.

He could have been the puppet master using Jar Jar Binks's body he could have been Darth Plagues but nooooooo. They just created a scary looking villain and gave him a half baked back story in the final movie.
 

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If they know what's right they'll have Lucas and Filoni overseeing the project and writing for all three of the next trilogy. Filoni has proved himself again and again with The Clone Wars, Rebels and The Mandalorian. He just gets it.

For anyone interesting, I highly recommend you watch this short clip of Dave Filoni talking at a roundtable about the prequels Duel of the Fates. His level of understanding of SW, the characters, its lore, is frankly what Disney need.

 

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I had the trilogy on in the background yesterday and it is pretty boring. I guess it is ok if you are a young kid that is new to Star Wars. Was very Disney like. Difficult to compare new with old due to changes in the target audience. That said I still enjoy the old ones. Empire Strikes back is still a great watch. The old ones felt far more deep and this one felt shallow. I was more on board with Luke's journey than the new characters ones. Darth Vader was also a better antangonist
 

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Was pretty clear they had no idea what they were doing with the story and made it up as they went along. I still think Rey not being connected to anyone makes for a better story, I hate all of this inter connected shite. It's unnecessary and lazy story telling.
 

ha_rooney

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If they know what's right they'll have Lucas and Filoni overseeing the project and writing for all three of the next trilogy. Filoni has proved himself again and again with The Clone Wars, Rebels and The Mandalorian. He just gets it.

For anyone interesting, I highly recommend you watch this short clip of Dave Filoni talking at a roundtable about the prequels Duel of the Fates. His level of understanding of SW, the characters, its lore, is frankly what Disney need.

Filoni should absolutely be the Feige equivalent for Star Wars. Then they would actually have some continuity with the films & not stories cobbled together.
 

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I didn't think there was anything 'politically correct' about it. What I thought the issues actually were centers on having far too many characters, introducing even more of them in the last part, no compelling story arcs, bottling the challenge of doing anything new by continuing the interesting bits from Last Jedi and bringing the Emperor back instead. Also having the main character, Rey, portrayed by someone with zero acting ability didn't help. Imagine spending the best part of a billion dollars to produce three films that nobody had bothered to write a coherent new story for at the start of the process.
Agreed, but there was quite a bit of PC in there, can't remember which one but there was one film where the droids fought for equal rights or some shit. Doesn't compute (literally).
 

decorativeed

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Agreed, but there was quite a bit of PC in there, can't remember which one but there was one film where the droids fought for equal rights or some shit. Doesn't compute (literally).
I wouldn't call that political correctness, it's a standard ethics question that's been part of sci-fi for decades.
 

Yagami

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They actually made the prequels look good by comparison. That's how bad this trilogy was.

The worst thing for me is still how they killed Luke's character. From a personality standpoint; not his actual death. Which did suck, too.
 

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They actually made the prequels look good by comparison. That's how bad this trilogy was.

The worst thing for me is still how they killed Luke's character. From a personality standpoint; not his actual death. Which did suck, too.
I still think that TFA is a good film. Sure, it's a straight rip off of A New Hope but it had a lot of charm. It also felt like it had an idea of what kind of film it was thematically, and Kylo Ren was an amazing character that went through one of the most satisfying arcs in the entire series.

And then the second film happened. Which I also enjoyed, but purely as a stand alone film. As part of a trilogy it's a complete mess and, along with the third, ruins the whole thing.

I don't understand why the third film was missing the same charm as the first considering JJ directed both. It's almost like he didn't give a shit and just wanted the third film done with since he wasn't meant to come back anyway. And for the sake of more nostalgia they brought back Lando, who seems to have forgotten what acting is, just so he could magically - blink and you'll miss the single sentence that tells the audience what he's going to be doing - bring the entire galaxy to come fight at the end, when that whole thing should have been the B story in the film starring Finn and Rose.

Actually, for me that's the issue. The first film set things up and left enough wiggle room for Rian Johnson. But then he ignored all of it and just made the movie he wanted to make. Which in turn made JJ ignore Rian's stuff for the third one. So who's to blame? Johnson for going off script, JJ for not trying to make it work in the third? A complete lack of vision from the entire team? Or just Disney not giving a toss, like they seem to be doing recently, and just making any old shit and expecting it to do well because it's an iconic brand?
 

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And it's been said before but the real series they should've made has already been done. Knights of the Old Republic.
 

hungrywing

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They kinda didnt have a plan for her going into the second movie either.
ill never understand hiring different directors and letting them decide the how the story goes (thus that middle we had)
'Cause the person in charge (Kennedy/Woodward) isn't really a movie person but a business person who got their job on the back of a superhuman movie person (SAF/Spielberg) and thought they were way more able then they were. (They weren't)
 

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They actually made the prequels look good by comparison. That's how bad this trilogy was.

The worst thing for me is still how they killed Luke's character. From a personality standpoint; not his actual death. Which did suck, too.
It is possible for characters to change as they get older and experience more pain. We don't know what Luke went through in the 30 odd years since then so character changes are not impossible. That said, they made him trash.
 

SuperiorXI

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I wouldn't call that political correctness, it's a standard ethics question that's been part of sci-fi for decades.
How can you have a pre-programmed machine start fighting for equal rights? It's fecking daft, there's surely better and more creative ways to slip a dose of morality in there.
 

cafecillos

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How can you have a pre-programmed machine start fighting for equal rights? It's fecking daft, there's surely better and more creative ways to slip a dose of morality in there.
Hardly the only daft thing that robots do in Star Wars, just the one that bothers you most.
 

Fingeredmouse

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How can you have a pre-programmed machine start fighting for equal rights? It's fecking daft, there's surely better and more creative ways to slip a dose of morality in there.
They're meant to be highly sophisticated AIs not factory line assemble robots. There's nothing daft at all about intelligent, self aware and (clearly as is frequently demonstrated) emotional artificial beings making autonomous decisions.
These sorts of questions have been getting asked and explored in many different ways in Sci-Fi for so long now that they're a tired cliche (without even thinking or going outwith mainstream US Movies: AI, (the terrible) I, Robot, Terminator, The Matrix, Bicentennial Man).
If toasters were out with placards I'd take your point.
 

SuperiorXI

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Hardly the only daft thing that robots do in Star Wars, just the one that bothers you most.
There's a lot more dafter shit I won't go into...



They're meant to be highly sophisticated AIs not factory line assemble robots. There's nothing daft at all about intelligent, self aware and (clearly as is frequently demonstrated) emotional artificial beings making autonomous decisions.
These sorts of questions have been getting asked and explored in many different ways in Sci-Fi for so long now that they're a tired cliche (without even thinking or going outwith mainstream US Movies: AI, (the terrible) I, Robot, Terminator, The Matrix, Bicentennial Man).
If toasters were out with placards I'd take your point.
Surely they'd lob some sort of security measure in there, if they're smart enough to make them intelligent and self aware.
 

Sylar

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Jar Jar could have been the greatest heel if they pulled the trigger on that.
 

decorativeed

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How can you have a pre-programmed machine start fighting for equal rights? It's fecking daft, there's surely better and more creative ways to slip a dose of morality in there.
Like another poster above said, that kind of thing was written about by Isaac Asimov back in the 1950s. That was a long time before anyone had ever joined the two words political and correctness together. I was happy to let that slide in a Star Wars film without it annoying me. Watching some horses run up the side of a starcruiser on the other hand...
 

Mr Pigeon

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'Cause the person in charge (Kennedy/Woodward) isn't really a movie person but a business person who got their job on the back of a superhuman movie person (SAF/Spielberg) and thought they were way more able then they were. (They weren't)
But Kennedy absolutely is a movie person. Studied film, had jobs as a camera operator and video editor before becoming a movie producer for Spielberg after he was impressed with her production work on Raiders. They then founded Amblin together. Been working in cinema ever since. She's a proper producer and worked her ass up through the ranks to get the job she has now, which is why this whole Star Wars debacle is really strange.
 

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But Kennedy absolutely is a movie person. Studied film, had jobs as a camera operator and video editor before becoming a movie producer for Spielberg after he was impressed with her production work on Raiders. They then founded Amblin together. Been working in cinema ever since. She's a proper producer and worked her ass up through the ranks to get the job she has now, which is why this whole Star Wars debacle is really strange.
Uh regarding the bolded part do you mean the brief internship at the local TV news station? Where you're shuttled around to various posts to learn what people do before taking up a production assistant and/or slightly higher role?

Were you trying to play some 'I know some stuff 'bout movies' card with the Amblin thing? Absolutely not having a go. The reason I'm asking is did you just hear/know that she was a member of that production company and assumed she was really creative to have gotten that position?

Do you know what a 'line producer' is? And not the wiki definition. That's not going to help you if you've not been in the business. AKA, was Francis Ford Coppola a line producer on Dracula?

I'm asking because if you knew that, then you'd know the answer to 'why this whole Star Wars debacle is really strange'.

There are largely two types of producers. Creative producers and line producers. Obviously there's some overlap but if you say the term people in the business know what you mean. The latter are the 'handle shit that happens on set' people. These people have not a creative bone in their body. They handle money and they handle problems. Director is being a diva and the union rep brings it up? Line producer steps in. Catering fecked up? Line producer. Propmaster says he needs just $10000 more to get some technical wigdet? Line producer. This is Kathleen Kennedy. Not a single creative bone in her body. Vast majority of her career is supporting Spielberg. A few other projects with other good directors. She stays out of the way and makes sure everyone is getting what they need and want within a budget.

Creative producers are like Jon Favreau with Star Wars. Coppola with all his projects after he got bored with directing. Luc Besson with those euro-action movies (he also works a bit as a line producer). Spielberg himself (kind of) with the Transformers movies. They recognize and hire the talent: the directors, they hire the composers, the production designers etc. They can get very hands on in the creative decisions.

You may have noticed a lot of the big name producers work in pairs. Mario Kassar/Andrew Vajna, Don Simpson/Jerry Bruckheimer, Frank Marshall/Kathleen Kennedy. This is that tandem of more-creative/more-business-minded dynamic at work. (Frank Marshall's done some decent directing)

Hope this helps.
 

Mr Pigeon

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Uh regarding the bolded part do you mean the brief internship at the local TV news station? Where you're shuttled around to various posts to learn what people do before taking up a production assistant and/or slightly higher role?

Were you trying to play some 'I know some stuff 'bout movies' card with the Amblin thing? Absolutely not having a go. The reason I'm asking is did you just hear/know that she was a member of that production company and assumed she was really creative to have gotten that position?

Do you know what a 'line producer' is? And not the wiki definition. That's not going to help you if you've not been in the business. AKA, was Francis Ford Coppola a line producer on Dracula?

I'm asking because if you knew that, then you'd know the answer to 'why this whole Star Wars debacle is really strange'.

There are largely two types of producers. Creative producers and line producers. Obviously there's some overlap but if you say the term people in the business know what you mean. The latter are the 'handle shit that happens on set' people. These people have not a creative bone in their body. They handle money and they handle problems. Director is being a diva and the union rep brings it up? Line producer steps in. Catering fecked up? Line producer. Propmaster says he needs just $10000 more to get some technical wigdet? Line producer. This is Kathleen Kennedy. Not a single creative bone in her body. Vast majority of her career is supporting Spielberg. A few other projects with other good directors. She stays out of the way and makes sure everyone is getting what they need and want within a budget.

Creative producers are like Jon Favreau with Star Wars. Coppola with all his projects after he got bored with directing. Luc Besson with those euro-action movies (he also works a bit as a line producer). Spielberg himself (kind of) with the Transformers movies. They recognize and hire the talent: the directors, they hire the composers, the production designers etc. They can get very hands on in the creative decisions.

You may have noticed a lot of the big name producers work in pairs. Mario Kassar/Andrew Vajna, Don Simpson/Jerry Bruckheimer, Frank Marshall/Kathleen Kennedy. This is that tandem of more-creative/more-business-minded dynamic at work. (Frank Marshall's done some decent directing)

Hope this helps.
You're bringing up creativity suddenly as if that was your original point. It wasn't. You implied that she wasn't a movie person and compared her to Woodward.

Hope this helps.
 
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hungrywing

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You're bringing up creativity suddenly as if that was your original point. It wasn't. You implied that she wasn't a movie person. The head of a studio doesn't need to be creative, they need to understand the company.

Hope this helps.
It absolutely was the point. She's a business person in the business of movies. She's not a creative movie person like a Spielberg or a Zemeckis or a Tarkovsky etc. If you still don't get that after the long response for your benefit, then you're probably never going to get it. You're really all over the place here flailing to try to be 'right' instead of using a learning opportunity.

I also like how you thought the 'Hope this helps' was sarcastic. Protip,:don't project. Not everyone is angry and out to get you and wanting to so desperately be right like you. Some people are genuinely trying to help. Best of luck, buddy. (That's not sarcastic)

Also protip: think to yourself how you're defining 'movie person'. Is a movie person automatically amazeballs at every aspect of production?
 

Revan

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If they know what's right they'll have Lucas and Filoni overseeing the project and writing for all three of the next trilogy. Filoni has proved himself again and again with The Clone Wars, Rebels and The Mandalorian. He just gets it.

For anyone interesting, I highly recommend you watch this short clip of Dave Filoni talking at a roundtable about the prequels Duel of the Fates. His level of understanding of SW, the characters, its lore, is frankly what Disney need.

Filoni should have been the man for Star Wars after Disney bought LucasArts and retired Lucas. Not sure if he is a good enough writer and director for real movies (though loved his work on all three Star Wars TV shows he was involved), but for sure he should have been involved in some executive producer role and not leave the non Star Wans fans feck the project.
 

Mr Pigeon

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It absolutely was the point. She's a business person in the business of movies. She's not a creative movie person like a Spielberg or a Zemeckis or a Tarkovsky etc. If you still don't get that after the long response for your benefit, then you're probably never going to get it. You're really all over the place here flailing to try to be 'right' instead of using a learning opportunity.

I also like how you thought the 'Hope this helps' was sarcastic. Protip,:don't project. Not everyone is angry and out to get you and wanting to so desperately be right like you. Some people are genuinely trying to help. Best of luck, buddy. (That's not sarcastic)

Also protip: think to yourself how you're defining 'movie person'. Is a movie person automatically amazeballs at every aspect of production?
You're also jumping to further conclusions.

But, simply because I have no interest in a dick waving competition, here's a more on topic question. Does the head of a studio necessarily need to be creative in order to be successful?

Edited because there's too much beauty in the world for ongoing off topic talk.
 
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hungrywing

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Never did I once assume that because she was a producer that she was creative
Okay. You seemed to do so by rattling off her 'camera operator' and 'video edting' credentials as well as 'founding member of Amblin' as if the first two denoted extensive artistic training and informed the latter.

- I think you're the one that did that and unfortunately wasted your time posting all of that. You should've been clearer with your initial statement or at least tried to clarify it.
Nope. Per above you sounded misinformed and you seemed like you were genuinely curious so no not a waste of time at all. And I have a lot of time for people wondering how Star Wars got screwed up. Also killing time till the game anyways.

If your post wasn't a one up attempt then I'm afraid you need to work on your netiquette because you have come across as arrogant and condescending. I suggest you work on that.
Nope, I'm good. If I were arrogant I would have laughed in your face at how off-base your replies were in trying to 'out movie knowledge' the other person or implying that I would 'unfortunately' waste my time. Gave you the benefit of the doubt all the way through.

Bottom line, forget all the other stuff: if you were wondering how Star Wars turned out the way it did under Kathleen Kennedy with all her extensive experience, it's because she's a line producer (business/logistics producer) who tried her hand at - or to be nitpickingly accurate, was given license to try her hand at - the other aspect of producing.
 

Yagami

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I still think that TFA is a good film. Sure, it's a straight rip off of A New Hope but it had a lot of charm. It also felt like it had an idea of what kind of film it was thematically, and Kylo Ren was an amazing character that went through one of the most satisfying arcs in the entire series.

And then the second film happened. Which I also enjoyed, but purely as a stand alone film. As part of a trilogy it's a complete mess and, along with the third, ruins the whole thing.

I don't understand why the third film was missing the same charm as the first considering JJ directed both. It's almost like he didn't give a shit and just wanted the third film done with since he wasn't meant to come back anyway. And for the sake of more nostalgia they brought back Lando, who seems to have forgotten what acting is, just so he could magically - blink and you'll miss the single sentence that tells the audience what he's going to be doing - bring the entire galaxy to come fight at the end, when that whole thing should have been the B story in the film starring Finn and Rose.

Actually, for me that's the issue. The first film set things up and left enough wiggle room for Rian Johnson. But then he ignored all of it and just made the movie he wanted to make. Which in turn made JJ ignore Rian's stuff for the third one. So who's to blame? Johnson for going off script, JJ for not trying to make it work in the third? A complete lack of vision from the entire team? Or just Disney not giving a toss, like they seem to be doing recently, and just making any old shit and expecting it to do well because it's an iconic brand?
I don't think I enjoyed 7 or 8 as much as you, but they were decent, and I do agree with the general point of your post.

As for your last paragraph, they all have to share the blame as you say, but Disney should hold most of it. You can tell they didn't put that much effort into it; expecting it to sell and be loved based off the name alone.
And it's been said before but the real series they should've made has already been done. Knights of the Old Republic.
I always wanted a movie/series based off Kyle Katarn and Luke rebuilding the Jedi like in the Jedi Knight games, myself.
It is possible for characters to change as they get older and experience more pain. We don't know what Luke went through in the 30 odd years since then so character changes are not impossible. That said, they made him trash.
I don't think I'll ever agree with what they did with Luke. Luke would've never tried to do what he did to Kylo, imo, and Mark Hamill thought so, too. It just reeked of character assassination in order to make Rey more of a hero. Luke never gave up on Anakindespite everything he did so making Lukegive up on Ben so easily - despite not really doing anything yet - was just wrong.
Jar Jar could have been the greatest heel if they pulled the trigger on that.
He already is Star Wars' biggest heel, tbh. If anything, that would've turned him babyface.
 

Mr Pigeon

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Okay. You seemed to do so by rattling off her 'camera operator' and 'video edting' credentials as well as 'founding member of Amblin' as if the first two denoted extensive artistic training and informed the latter.



Nope. Per above you sounded misinformed and you seemed like you were genuinely curious so no not a waste of time at all. And I have a lot of time for people wondering how Star Wars got screwed up. Also killing time till the game anyways.



Nope, I'm good. If I were arrogant I would have laughed in your face at how off-base your replies were in trying to 'out movie knowledge' the other person or implying that I would 'unfortunately' waste my time. Gave you the benefit of the doubt all the way through.

Bottom line, forget all the other stuff: if you were wondering how Star Wars turned out the way it did under Kathleen Kennedy with all her extensive experience, it's because she's a line producer (business/logistics producer) who tried her hand at - or to be nitpickingly accurate, was given license to try her hand at - the other aspect of producing.
That's a fair assessment, although I take umbrage to the accusation that I tried to out knowledge anyone. On anything. FFS I even thought that she had creative input into Raiders.


I don't think I enjoyed 7 or 8 as much as you,
They're really like the Marmite of Star Wars films aren't they?
 

Stacks

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I don't think I enjoyed 7 or 8 as much as you, but they were decent, and I do agree with the general point of your post.

As for your last paragraph, they all have to share the blame as you say, but Disney should hold most of it. You can tell they didn't put that much effort into it; expecting it to sell and be loved based off the name alone.

I always wanted a movie/series based off Kyle Katarn and Luke rebuilding the Jedi like in the Jedi Knight games, myself.

I don't think I'll ever agree with what they did with Luke. Luke would've never tried to do what he did to Kylo, imo, and Mark Hamill thought so, too. It just reeked of character assassination in order to make Rey more of a hero. Luke never gave up on Anakindespite everything he did so making Lukegive up on Ben so easily - despite not really doing anything yet - was just wrong.

He already is Star Wars' biggest heel, tbh. If anything, that would've turned him babyface.
Luke was an optimistic kid then. He hadn't really been through much heartbreak or wear and tear. This is 30 years later where they whole cycle of good, evil and the darkside keep repeating despite his best efforts and victory at the battle of Endor. experiences and time changes peoples perceptions of the world.
 

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That's a fair assessment, although I take umbrage to the accusation that I tried to out knowledge anyone. On anything. FFS I even thought that she had creative input into Raiders...
Nope.

On the above webpage is the transcript* of George Lucas, Steven Spielberg and Lawrence Kasdan brainstorming the story of Raiders. One can see them do the whole movie (and then some) in this session.

*In the middle of that Gizmodo article there's a little window with a readable pdf in it. If you click on the '>>' at the top right of that small window you can download the pdf to read at your leisure.
 

Yagami

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They're really like the Marmite of Star Wars films aren't they?
I feel like you could say that about most Star Wars films, tbh! I've heard people praise and criticise the originals, prequels and sequels. I think 4 and 5 are the only ones that probably have a general consensus of being good, 1, 2 and 9 of being bad, and 3, 7 and 8 are probably 50/50.
Luke was an optimistic kid then. He hadn't really been through much heartbreak or wear and tear. This is 30 years later where they whole cycle of good, evil and the darkside keep repeating despite his best efforts and victory at the battle of Endor. experiences and time changes peoples perceptions of the world.
To be fair, he did lose both of his "parents" to the empire, his dad killed his - I guess - idol in Obi-Wan, and his dad chopped off his arm. He still kept faith in him and believed that good would prevail, which it did.

I get you're general point, though, and you are right that time changes people, but don't you think Luke gave up too easily after everything? Especially for someone that symbolised hope throughout the entire franchise prior? If he was going to become a cynical old grump who contemplated killing his nephew, I think it should've took more than what it did to turn him.