Over the holidays, we went and saw The Last Jedi. My overall impression was that it was an OK film with some really good scenes. However, there was one major underlying problem that I had with the film, and that is communication, or lack there of. Be warned, if you haven't seen the movie yet, you might want to skip this post as it does contain spoilers.
Still with me? OK, here we go.
The film opens with the Rebels/Resistance/whatever-you-want-to-call-them fleeing their base in three ships. The First Order jumps in with four star destroyers and one dreadnought. Here is where the lack of communication, as well as military incompetence, starts to show.
Poe spearheads an attack on the dreadnought's defenses, which apparently doesn't have defenses against small, one-man fighters. He knocks them all out and calls in the bombers. (I won't get into my problems with them as ships here.) Leia calls Poe and tells him to call off the attack. Poe ignores here and switches off his comm.
Leia then decides to NOT order the bombers to stop and return to the transports. Let me state that again, the GENERAL in charge DID NOT order the bombers to return. All of the bombers are then destroyed in the attack, for the which Leia blames Poe! Yes, he refused her order to return and he should be punished for that, but SHE could have called the bombers back, and DIDN'T! It's Leia's fault all those people died and the rebels lost those "valuable" ships.
Next, there's Vice Admiral Amilyn Holdo. She takes command when Leia is incapacitated and decides not to tell Poe what her plan is. Again, no problem here. He has shown himself to be a hot-head and has ignored orders in this very film. However, she seemingly doesn't tell ANYONE what her plan is. I understand the reveal they were going for, the "we're not giving up, we're fleeing to a base" thing, but there are some of the crew that helped Poe in his mutiny that should have known what was really going on.
There's playing close to the vest and then there's keeping people who need to know out of the loop. Would anything have changed with Fin, Poe, and Rose? Maybe, maybe not. At the very least, it would have given the characters information they should have had. They might have even worked WITH Holdo to make the plan a success rather than the string of failures that it was.
I don't hate the film, but these were some of the things that my brain could get around while watching.
=========================
Like what I'm doing here on the blog and podcast? Why not check out my Patreon Page to see how you can help me do more? http://www.patreon.com/TheHammerStrikes
No comments:
Post a Comment