Rian Johnson Grapples with the Totality of the Star Wars Franchise in the Brazen, Brilliant Last Jedi

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Photo Courtesy of Lucasfilm Ltd. © 2017 Lucasfilm Ltd. All Rights Reserved

The Last Jedi looks like space. There is an almost infinite depth to its endless skies, to the eyes of its characters, to the vastness of its voids. It’s populated with alien creatures, huge battleships, and carefully rendered planets. It’s huge. In the (at the time of this writing) four days since its release, a lot has already been written on how Jedi breaks the Star Wars formula, burning down – oftentimes literally – past constructions of heroism, faith, and order as they have applied to the 40-year-old franchise. What hasn’t been said quite as often is how The Last Jedi, 34 years after the conclusion of the original Star Wars trilogy and three years into the revival Star Wars franchise, returns us to space in a way nothing has since 1983.

Maybe it’s that Rian Johnson, writer-director of The Last Jedi and an accomplished genre filmmaker in his own right, has a preternatural sense of how this universe has worked and endured like no other film franchise ever will. He has restored the compositional simplicity of the original trilogy – again, that emphasis on making the vastness of space feel truly vast. Imposing enemies are literalized by the weight and size the camera lends them. Deep reds and blacks are multipurpose, communicating malicious order, uncertainty, and passion. The Last Jedi is beautiful to look at, but still intentional in the way it revels in and changes its world. When Johnson breaks something, or modifies the way we perceive Star Wars’ enduring themes – good and evil, the nature of resistance, and the faith that aids that resistance – it’s never unreasonable or out of place, but thrilling; he has evolved and built the franchise, somehow, into something new and exciting while never fully forsaking the past.

The Last Jedi is a balancing act, but unlike the similarly positioned Force Awakens, avoids the retreading of the previous film. Johnson is playing with the original trilogy, but he also greatly bolsters The Force Awakens by strengthening the motivations of its well-acted but somewhat nebulous new characters from the last episode. The swashbuckling Poe Dameron (Oscar Isaac) grows beyond his Resistance-symbol imperviousness; Force-sensitive Rey (Daisy Ridley) gets to hone her powers and assert her status as the franchise’s most motivated, compassionate protagonist; and ex-Stormtrooper Finn (John Boyega) alongside newcomer Rose Tico (Kelly Marie Tran, a standout addition to a cast seemingly built of charisma) is defined more explicitly than ever by the sum of his fears and commitments. In its development of Kylo Ren, The Last Jedi hones in on one of The Force Awakens’ primary strengths and makes it even stronger: the combination of Adam Driver’s intense, ambiguous performance and the brilliant conception of the villain itself are brilliantly explored and expanded. Volatile, childish, and lost, Kylo Ren is Anakin Skywalker done right, and The Last Jedi simultaneously admits his villainy while shading him in with a broken, all-but-forgotten humanity. He is the kind of villain any major franchise could want, and what so few today can accomplish – complex while still identifiably, resolutely evil.

Of course, The Last Jedi is still beholden to its veterans, as Luke Skywalker returns to the franchise in brilliant fashion. The appropriately grizzled Mark Hamill is a delight from start to finish, and like the newer characters, Luke Skywalker is redefined in thrilling and empathetic ways that never deviate too far from Luke’s original cloth. Accepting his transformation is certainly aided by his island hideout, a pure 70s Star Wars throwback that capitalizes on the weirdo alien designs of the original trilogy. There is a surprising emphasis on jokes in the film, celebrating the goofier aspects of the original trilogy while contrasting with the darker psychological realities more readily explored in the 2010s Star Wars trilogy. Skywalker’s placement in this film may be cyclical, as Rey learns from him as he did from Yoda so many years ago, but the radically altered psychological makeup of the Jedi master lends an old story beat new vitality. The Force has never been more clearly or poetically understood as it is here.

Lucasfilm Ltd. © 2017 Lucasfilm Ltd. All Rights Reserved

It is somewhere between Luke’s weariness and Leia’s careful resilience that The Last Jedi locates its best idea in a sea of brilliant inversions, tributes, and innovations. Star Wars is, at its core, universal in theme – it tells maybe the most enduring good vs. evil story in all of film. There were still Star Wars conventions when there were no new Star Wars films. Childhoods are built on these things. People of all ages find something to love in these films. This story, regardless of how it’s told or with which characters, can be told, has been told, and should be told, forever. The Last Jedi knows resistance can be exhausting, and feel ineffective, or small, or hopeless, but it will always be there. Surviving to live another day is as important to the fight as the fight itself, because the story and symbols of Resistance can only endure if they are carefully maintained.

The Last Jedi is, more than anything, overwhelming in the best way: it’s two and a half hours long but flies by, it’s densely packed and bursting with ideas, self-contained but rich in context, dazzlingly shot, tense, and evocative. It’s so full of stuff, I didn’t even get to talk about Carrie Fisher until now, the sixth and final paragraph of this review. She is, of course, magical, and a particular exchange between Leia and Laura Dern’s Admiral Holdo serves as a bittersweet, heart-rending tribute to the actor’s unshakeable stamp on an iconic franchise. She’s wonderful here, and will be sorely missed come Episode IX. Maybe they just shouldn’t make another one of these. If Star Wars ended today, The Last Jedi would certainly be a worthy final entry in the franchise. The Force is strong with this one, and stronger than it’s been in a long time.


CAMERON FAIRCHILD | Force-Sensitive | KXSU Arts Reporter

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