If it's not a good game or catholic...who do you call?...why Pokematic "hi."
Well I already wrote a fan story map for Episode 9, and I decided "might as well do Episode 8 since that's where everything fell apart." I know I said "I liked it," but I was naïve at the time (or in denial), it sucked. Since it would be to easy to just "scrap everything, start anew," I wanted to work within the confines of what I laid out in my Episode 9 rewrite and what was done in Episode 7. Basically I have to end in the same place (Rey has no master, Kylo is going to try to take over the galaxy, Snoke is dead, Rey's parents are nobodies) and start in the same place (Rey finds Luke hiding on a far off planet).
OK first off, I'm not even going to waste my time rewriting the Finn and Poe sub-plots; the ones where Finn and Rose go to the gambling planet to find a code breaker and Poe's attempt at mutiny to save the fleet in the slow moving space race, and both of those ultimately lead to nothing. Yeah, those could have been cut entirely and nothing really would have changed, it was all filler. One could argue "it lets us learn more about Finn and Poe, and introduces this new character Rose," but I don't think we learn anything new about any of them (we all know Poe is "the hot shot pilot," Finn doesn't understand the world, and no one cares about Rose). I don't even know where to start with this because I can replace it with anything and it would make just as much sense. Maybe Finn and Poe get onto a First Order ship and steal some plans, find themselves able to stop them from destroying a resistance base but that would result in them destroying another base, and they have to make a Sophie's Choice and live with the consequences. Anything not "slow space race running out of fuel, sacrifice all our ships" and "we are weapons dealers, we make money off both sides, real world commentary."
The main thing I want to look into is Luke and Rey's story. The main thing we need to answer is "why was Luke absent from the first movie?" I'm going to take an unpopular opinion, but I'm going to keep Luke as a defeated old man that ran away, and he is responsible for creating Kylo Ren. Before you click away, hear me out. Luke is the most powerful Jedi in the galaxy at the end of Episode 6 (because he's the last), and in the events between Episode 6 and Episode 7 Luke tries to start a new Jedi order and it doesn't work out as evident by there being no Jedi in Episode 7, and when the First Order is taking over the galaxy in Episode 7 Luke is absent. If Luke wasn't a defeated old man, don't you think he would be there next to his sister fighting the First Order? For what reason would Luke have to be out on some deserted planet with no way for anyone to find him while the galaxy fell to ruin if he wasn't hiding? If he was off developing some "super force technique," he would have trusted Han or Leia with that information and his whereabouts if necessary (and it certainly was necessary), but they didn't know where he is. Luke also has a history of self doubt and cockiness, it's his character flaw in Episode 4 and 5 that he must overcome in Episode 6. I don't think it is out of character for Luke to be so humiliated after a defeat to be driven into a life of solitude; plus, I am going to have him screw up SO badly that it would be hard for anyone to show their face let alone imperfect Luke Skywalker.
OK, so here's the back story for why Luke is ashamed and ran away. Between Episode 6 and 7 Luke finds some force sensitive younglings and sets out to train a new generation of Jedi, and in his first class is his nephew Ben Solo. Luke has 2 small problems that come together to form one major problem though; Luke is a gray Jedi (a good Jedi that does not let occasional use of the dark side corrupt him), and his Jedi training is incomplete and therefore doesn't know how to teach. In Episode 5 Ben Kenobi and Yoda tell Luke that his training is incomplete, and in Episode 6 Vader and Palpatine tell Luke "join us in order to complete your training." Luke is barely a Jedi Knight, and in the Prequels only masters could take on padwans. Luke is the highest ranking and most skilled Jedi now because he is the only one, but that doesn't mean his is meant to teach. Luke also engages with the dark side and does things that are against the light Jedi way. In Episode 6 he can be seen force choking the guards at Jabba's palace. The only other characters to do this are dark Jedi (and Asoka, who was trained by Darth Vader; you never see pure light Obi-Wan use it), and the lore says "this is a dark force power." Luke also abandoned his Jedi training to help his friends, because he has worldly ties to people, something that draws Jedi to the dark side (see Anakin), and no light Jedi have, but Luke has those worldly ties and therefore isn't the "pure light Jedi" that padwans would need. Gray Jedi can be good teachers (see Qui-Gon), but they must also be great Jedi masters and not barely Jedi knights. For these reasons, Luke was doomed to fail as a teacher.
Here's how it went down. Luke has set-out to start the new Jedi Order, and he finds 5 force sensitive younglings, including his nephew. Luke teaches them the ways of the force, and force ghost Obi-Wan, Yoda, and Anakin consult him on his teaching techniques. They are quite pleased with Luke's teachings, except for the fact that he sometimes incorporates dark force in the lessons. As a gray Jedi, Luke thinks there is no bad force, just bad users, and for one to be a full Jedi one must have respectful use of the dark side. All of the padawans are shaping up to be great Jedi, all except for Ben Solo. All 3 force ghosts warn Luke that Ben is not taking away the proper information from his lessons, and that he is being seduced by the dark side. Luke calls out Obi-Wan and Yoda saying "you said the same thing about my father and I ended up being right about him still being good," and then addresses Anakin "and had they taught you a healthy understanding and respect for the dark side like Qui-Gon would have done I wouldn't have had to bring you back, I see the good in your grandson the same way that I saw the good in you, and I'm going to do for him what should have been done for you." That's the cockiness of Luke, and he's not even wrong on it; Obi-Wan and Yoda were wrong about Vader being unredeemable, and Qui-Gon could have given Anakin the proper training to be a powerful gray Jedi.
Luke ends up being wrong though, he isn't able to reign in Ben's dark tendencies, and this is when Ben find secret Palpatine apprentice Snoke. At the end of Episode 7 we don't know who Snoke is, or where he came from after the sith were wiped out at the end of Episode 6, and we need to find out the answers in this movie because Snoke is dead in Episode 9. We know that Vader was Palpatine's true apprentice in Episodes 3-6, but Palpatine is constantly surrounded by people and followers, so maybe there was a force sensitive user that he didn't officially train but let him listen in on the lessons with Darth Vader, and he "secretly" learned the ways of the dark side of the force. That, or Snoke is Darth JarJar after he drops the fool act and disfigures himself to be unrecognizable. Both are equally legitimate as far as I'm concerned and either way, Snoke and Ben are drawn to each other and Snoke promises to teach Ben the ways of the dark side. Before Snoke can teach Ben, he has to sever his ties to his Jedi teachings, by killing all of his classmates and master Luke. Ben agrees, and one night he kills all his class mates in their sleep. Ben then goes to kill Luke, but Luke pulls the old "pillow under the blanket emerge from shadows" routine, and force restrains Ben while trying to talk sense into him. Ben is to strong though, and breaks free of Luke's force restrains and charges at Luke with a light saber. Luke pulls out his light saber and blocks the strike, again telling Ben "I won't fight you, I sense the good in you, it's not too late." Ben isn't hearing any of this and cuts off Luke's legs as he draws his light saber down off Luke's light saber, and then force chokes Luke. When he thinks Luke is dead, he throws him off to the side and sets fire to the Jedi temple. Luke isn't dead though, and force levitates himself to safety.
Leia feels the disturbance at the Jedi temple when Ben starts killing his classmates and finds a dying Luke in the rubble. She takes him to get medical treatment and like his father now has mechanical legs. This is OK because we don't actually see Luke's legs at the end of Episode 7, and prosthetics are very life like in this universe so even if we did it's still plausible. As is to be expected, Luke is distraught; his 3 guides warned him about Ben, they told him he was making a grave mistake, and he did it anyway because he thought he knew better, and he drove his nephew to the dark side which resulted in the death of his other 4 students and crippling of himself. He blames himself, and doesn't know how to live with himself. Leia tries to console him, as does Han saying "kid, Ben just has that bad boy smuggler blood in him, you remember how hard it was to get me to care about people," but Luke is just too broken up. Han tells Luke about how he saw Ben going after political power and that he's the only one who can stop him, but Luke says he can't do that now because he's too weak and not used to these robotic legs, and he has to go away for a while to train himself up. Leia offers to join him since she is also strong in the force and wants to refine her abilities, but Luke said "no, I have to go alone, and can't be bothered." Luke finds the planet and does some training, but fails badly (falls over, can't lift rocks anymore, burns himself on his light saber, things like that), and just gives up because he realizes he will never be able to beat Kylo Ren.
Now that we have "why Luke was absent from Episode 7," how does that influence him with Rey in episode 8? Luke still is not going to accept his returned light saber, but instead of disrespectfully throwing it over his shoulder, he's going to drop it and sulk away. The subtle difference here is by throwing it over his shoulder, Luke is saying "I am above this, it's garbage," whereas if he just drops it he is showing his defeatist attitude saying "I can't even bring myself to hold this, I'm not worthy." Here he is too humble. Luke still doesn't want to train Rey, but it's because he doesn't think he is good enough to train another Jedi, not because he wants the Jedi to end. The conflict of "Luke refuses to train Rey" is still present and gives us something deeper than Yoda on Dagobah, but why Luke is refusing is different and is far more in line with who he is. Luke avoids Rey similarly to how he did in actual Episode 8, but he's hiding from himself and saying "I'm washed up, a has been, I can't teach you anything, you're better off figuring it out for yourself." This goes on until one night when Luke is meditating he does a similar thing that Yoda did in Episode 5, by arguing with disembodied force ghosts.
Luke: She's very persistent, just won't take no for an answer.
Yoda: Another persistent padawan, she sounds just like.
Luke: *sigh* I just don't think I can take on another apprentice after what happened last time.
Obi-Wan: If I had said the same thing, we wouldn't be having this conversation right now.
Luke: *sigh* I wasn't able to stop Kylo Ren when I was whole, how am I going to stop him now that I'm broken?
Anakin: Son, I lost a lot more than you did and that didn't stop me. No one is asking you to fight Kylo Ren, all you're being asked to do is train the one who can.
Luke reluctantly agrees to train Rey, but only after he warns her about how he's a terrible teacher and that he is responsible for Kylo Ren. Rey reassures him that she is not like Kylo Ren, and she will stop him but only if Luke teaches her the ways of the force. There's some training montages, but they're all unsuccessful. Luke is trying to show Rey how to stack rocks, but he can't do it himself and Rey gets frustrated. She tries to encourage him (a student teaches the teacher thing), but it isn't working. This is when we have Kylo Ren do the force talk with Rey, because that wasn't an entirely bad idea just not the best executed. Kylo can still be "conflicted and salvagable," and they both try to convince each other to join their side, and Kylo is still trying to sew doubts about Luke and the light side in Rey, just that it would be based on strength and how weak the light side is compared to the dark side, point out crippled and weak Luke as the prime example, and how even as a dark padawan he was able to overpower a light Jedi knight. When Luke finds out about these conversations, he completely gives up. "Rey, I can't train you anymore, you are going to fall to the dark side like Kylo Ren, and maybe you should because I am weak." Rey frustrated storms off and says something like "I now see the legends about the great Luke Skywalker were myths, works of fiction, I believed in you not because you were a great Jedi master, but because you were a nobody farm boy, like me, and despite that you were able to save the galaxy, but now I see I was wrong to believe in you. I'm going to stop Kylo Ren, with or without your training." As Luke watches her fly away in the Falcon, her words really sink in, and some rocks start to levitate behind him. Luke's back.
The confrontation between Rey and Snoke would be kind of similar. Here we would get more exposition and back story about how Snoke found and trained Kylo, and say "I secretly trained under the great Darth Sidious and became equal in power to him," or "I am a powerful sith lord, because meesa masterin de chaos." He offers to train Rey, and Kylo still kills him, and a better choreographed fight ensues, and Kylo still does so because he wants to rule the galaxy with Rey. This leads into what I did with Episode 9.
The "not Hoth" battle can still happen, but maybe make it "more unlike Hoth," like a desert planet. Luke can also come back for one final battle, but this time Leia's going to help (because she also has the force, but just isn't as well versed as Luke). They tag team Kylo to buy the resistance time, and when the resistance is able to get away safely and Rey reaches them to see what is happening, they are both struck down a la Ben Kenobi call back. This tears Rey up because now she is truly alone and gives her some reason for her angst in Episode 9 (there are no more Jedi masters to learn from, she knew Leia would train her but now she can't, and she recognizes that she is not ready to take on Kylo).
And this is where we end Episode 8. This leads well into my fan script for Episode 9. The only thing that would need to change is the conversation between Kylo and Vader, where Kylo says "but Uncle Luke tried to kill me." It would have to be something like this:
Kylo: but I killed master Luke, and master Leia, and master Snoke, and my classmates. I am irredeemable.
Anakin: I too killed my masters and Jedi padawans, and I was still able to return to good.
Well that was fun. I hope you enjoyed my little Star Wars fan script, and how to improve the worst main-line Star Wars movie. This has been Pokematic, signing off, and bu-bye.
No comments:
Post a Comment