The true lessons from the Last Jedi

WE had many invitations this time around for the screening of the Star Wars’ latest addition to its long list of sequel-prequel movies. RHB Bank were perfect hosts, they started it off with a lovely buffet dinner which, in hindsight, was perfect for boosting our spirits in holding on to our seats for the entire 2 hours and 32 minutes.

To describe it in a single word, the movie was incongruent. Riddled with inconsistent personality, Kylo Ren, being evil enough as he is to kill his own father in cold blood, yet towards the end, humorous to the point of comical, just doesn’t jive.

The audience can’t help but to literally lose all respects for all his earlier evil conniving. The filmmakers’ attempt at lightening the mood with main characters rather than their usual comics, fell short of expectations at best.

Let’s not begin with the bizarre Leia turning into Mary Poppins moment, that really, what was the point. Having said that, no one does it better than Mary Poppins herself or cooler that Yondu Udonta from The Guardians of the Galaxy vol. 2.

So, stop it Star Wars, get your own scene. We were waiting with bated breath, mind you, for a crisis build and catharsis moment with her son Kylo Ren, seeing he had been so affected initially by the supposed ambivalence of killing her. Sigh… Sad.

Now, let’s talk about Jake Skywalker, er, I mean Luke Skywalker. For a guy, whose prowess has been built up over the past 4 episodes of the previous 7 Star Wars, we can’t help but feel the deepest disappointment at how it ends with Luke Skywalker.

The all-powerful Jedi who had managed to kill the only other previous best, bested by a virtual reality game fight with Kylo Ren- really? To quote Mark Hamill- “This is not my Luke Skywalker!”

So many scenes were considered redundant for the progression and conclusion of the movie, yet so much was lacking in order to explain further the plot developments, leaving us breathless to explain the situation to each other. Like, for example, how the hell did Rey get out of the most secure room of the ship without anyone noticing? And straight to the designated planet too, mind you.

The very same one so many hundreds died , being shot down at… At the end of the day, it felt like they were large flaws of inconsistent plot holes in the movie. Again, another long sigh here.

How can this be? What happened that so many things went so wrong so fast? (Depending on how one views 152 minutes of one’s life). To understand this, we must understand that movies are written and corrected in phases- script, production and post-production.

To be fair, let’s assume the flaws in the plot be due alternate endings and story lines, not an ultimate lapse of judgement in post-production storyline decisions. This may seem to be a good judgement, at first look, especially with the recent problems with leakages in plots, or outright whole films like the latest season of The Game of Thrones.

So, I guess the true lesson in this is real planning and early script writing as to not leave diehard fans of many decades totally and utterly disappointed. How does one tag George R.R. Martin here? Anyone?

* Mastura Rosly is a medical doctor and a psychiatric specialist-trainee who observes social behaviour

** The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the position of Astro AWANI.