"Star Wars 9: Return of the Jedi 2" Review

Star Wars 9: Return of the Jedi 2

Palpy is back baby. How? Is it a clone? A Sith Force ghost being brought back to life? Doesn't matter. Besides, telling the audience the details would be boring exposition, what are you gonna do, just write like a paragraph on screen at the beginning to explain it? ...And what does it matter how he died and came back? (Cut to the end of the movie where everyone celebrates that he's dead and they all just assume he's like, really, surely, dead this time...)

Palpy is back in the title crawl. What a great way to reveal a twist, super exciting stuff, totally doesn't undercut the intrigue or mystery of the opening of the film. They use title crawl to explain something that is going to become obvious, while offering zero exposition about how/why he is back. Basically they just reveal shit in the title crawl because it's Star Wars and they need a title crawl, but they put no thought into how to use it.

Palpy's not just back, but he's got 1,000 Death Star Destroyers. So he sets off on his murderous rampage, blowing up planets and revealing to the Galaxy the scope of his power. Just kidding, he sends like a galactic voicemail message? He announces to the universe that he's back...while his fleet is still grounded and vulnerable...because?

Where did they get the manpower to staff 1000 death star destroyers? From the sith planet? The Sith planet that looks like it's made of ruins and lightning and ghosts? Are we saying that in the mystery realm, secret uncharted lightning planet, full of sith ghosts...that they've got like a billion contractors manufacturing all the space toilets and star destroyer cafeterias? Or is Palpatine using Sith magic to conjure up star destroyer toilets? Hilarious. 

Member the whole “arms dealers” thing from The Last Jedi? J/K the whole Sith fleet is just made in the shadow realm or whatever...oh and they have MORE advanced technology in the secret shadow realm!

Why is the massive fleet all just on a planet and not in space? Like, is it too hard to have them deployed? Is it some kind of logistics/supply problem? I ask because...well they didn't seem to have any problems manufacturing a thousand of these things that are each more sophisticated than the Death Star... But then they leave them on the planet where they can't activate their shields and are totally super vulnerable. And they can't take off because they need a beacon to know which way is up? Because it's full of gravity wells or some shit? So the whole last act of the film is set around the idea that the 1000 super advanced ships can't just fly up, that they need a beacon or guidance. Keep in mind that this is their home planet, and they can't even try to navigate their way...up. 

Meanwhile thousands of rando good guys show up and can fly around no problem. But the fleet that is fucking from there has no idea how to fly up? 

 

When the good guys discover the existence of this Super Mega Massive fleet in the uncharted, unknown region of the galaxy, on some secret Sith planet that they have to track down multiple Macguffins to even find...they immediately somehow know intricate details of how the mega massive fleet works, requiring beacons, and knowing where the beacons will be and how to take them down. That's like Columbus arriving in the New World, and the Native Americans see his ship and are like “We have to murder them before they give us all smallpox.” (Hey! There's an idea, maybe instead of more giant super weapons, maybe...just maybe, you could have something different happen, like a biological weapon. Sithphylis!)

Hey Disney, I've got an idea for another Star Wars spinoff movie. It's called Rogue Two. It's all about how the rebellion figured out how the like beacon things worked. 

Just imagine if your enemy announces to the world that he's got a massive new set of super weapons, but they're all in one place, defenseless, and useless, and he's announcing it really loudly for all to hear during this period of vulnerability for no good reason . . . You would assume that this is the galaxy's most obvious trap of all time. (Cue up the fake underage girl from To Catch a Predator shouting from the next room: “I'm just gonna change into a bikini, you help yourself to a Mike's Hard Lemonade!”). 

Why doesn't Admiral Ackbar's son, Aftab Ackbar, immediately shout “It's a Trap!” At the very least, why isn't everyone really suspicious about this being a trap? Why do I as a first-time viewer feel like I've put more thought into the movie than any of the writers? If you're thinking right now, “okay, that's a bit harsh.” I'd like to point out ... Aftab Ackbar is not a joke I made up. He's in the movie!

So the plot boils down to a series of Macguffins: go to a place to find a thing, but to understand that thing, you need to go to a place and find a guy, and then you'll understand that thing and it'll tell you how to get to the next place to find the next thing, which will lead you to the secret planet.

Why did someone make a special knife, with ancient Sith writing on it, for the purpose of being a clue as to how to find a thing on the wreckage of the second death star? Like who is making this thing? Why? Who are they leaving this trail of breadcrumbs for? Is it the Emperor? Pulling all the strings and leaving the clues to lead the main characters into a trap? Except, he's also the emperor who really super doesn't want anybody to find the secret planet where his massive fleet is completely vulnerable and useless. We also know that Kylo didn't make it. So like, there's somebody with knowledge of secret Sith stuff who's leaving these clues behind...because?

The special dagger clue is only useful if you are standing in one exact place, and if the death star never moves or deteriorates in the constantly crashing waves. Yet the main characters just use it without needing to be in the right place? They just are there? Why hasn't the death star been reduced to scrap in the waves? Wait, why isn't it already just tiny pieces after we saw it explode into millions of tiny pieces at the end of Return of the Jedi?

 We know Kylo worships Vader, is like a fanboy who has Vader's helmet. We also see him seeking out a Sith wayfinder...but there's a sith wayfinder in the Emperor's throne room on the Death Star 2...Why didn't Kylo find that already?

In the desert, why does Kylo fly so low and try to ram Rey? Is he trying to run her over? Isn't he trying to turn her? So what is this manuever supposed to achieve? Why not just like shoot her from a distance? Obviously his real motivation here is that he's being stupid so that Rey can do a cool backflip thing.

We're 9 movies in to a series that's almost entirely about turning to the dark side, or resisting and staying  on the light side. The path to the dark side is tempting and a slippery slope. Yet 9 movies in and we still haven't seen a good depiction of what it means to be tempted by the dark side. Like, why is it so tempting? Why would a character that's repeatedly shown that they are good and pure be afraid that they would somehow be turned into child murderers? What would tempt them to do that? As far as I can tell, the entire series revolves around bad guys attempting to turn good guys to the dark side. Palpatine turning Anakin, Vader/Palpatine trying to turn Luke. Snoke/Kylo/Palpatine trying to turn Rey. Yet in all of their grand planning, 9 films worth of Palpatine pulling the strings, the grand plan they come up with is to have a really obviously evil, devil-looking mother fucker, say creepy shit and hope that a few words will make the good guy decide that, “sure, okay, I'll start murdering children for you.” Hilariously, this actually works one time.

What you could do, is really illustrate the slippery slope. Show how doing a little bit of evil, embracing your hate/anger actually makes your more powerful, and you feel more powerful, and how that changes you. In Return of the Jedi this is manifested as Luke basically being able to swing a lightsaber a bit harder. In Revenge of the Sith, Anakin turns to the dark side and starts murdering children because a guy who just transformed into a demon in front of him promised to teach him how to cheat death (but then doesn't teach him that?). In this, Palpy again just looks like the devil and tries to say evil shit to a girl who wants nothing to do with him or his stupid powers.

Why not do something like show that if she embraces her hate/anger/dark-side she could gain more abilities. Like, maybe she does a mean thing, but then gets more power and can suddenly use that power to heal people. Maybe you could put someone she loves in serious danger/pain/dead and the only thing she can do to save them is to embrace the dark side at least a little bit to achieve that power? Or you know what, instead, let's just have her be able to heal for no reason. Yeah, let's go with that. How does she learn it? Doesn't matter. Remember when a dude became Darth Vader in the hope of achieving that power and then never was able to get it? Yeah, she can just do it. Oh and let's have her get Force Lightning powers too. By going a little evil and then getting a new power, thus illustrating how the dark side is tempting? No, actually it'll be by doing something good, but then a little lightning squirts out like when a pregnant lady laughs and pees a little bit.

Rey goes out of her way to heal a sand worm/snake thing and heals Kylo because, even though he's like a Space Hitler, she's pretty sure he's got a heart of gold and wants to make out with him. Yet elsewhere in the film she's fine with letting tons of Stormtroopers die like they don't matter at all and aren't people. In fact, she sometimes uses the Jedi Mind Trick so they can get past some guards, while other times they just fucking shoot them in the face. Good thing we know Stormtroopers are all evil. Oh but one of the main character good guys is a stormtrooper who turned good, and then we meet a lady who tells us about how a whole unit of stormtroopers defected...but then our heroes continue to murder them, even when it's not even necessary.

Speaking of Stormtroopers doing the right thing and not following orders... Remember how like a major part of The Last Jedi was that one of our heroes had to learn a lesson to...umm...blindly follow orders. 

Member how the resistance is whittled down to like 14 people at the end of The Last Jedi? This movie starts and we're just back to being the same rebellion again, with no discernible difference really, and apparently with enough power that going to take out 1000 death star destroyers is doable (with a little help from "people"). The resistance was down to 14 people and their entire fleet destroyed, and then Palpy sends his voicemail that he has a massive mega fleet that's way more powerful than the First Order which has already wiped out the resistance fleet. And their response to this news is to just go on a series of side quests to find the massive mega fleet, because once they know where it is, they can totally take on that fleet directly . . . Why not spend some of the plot of this movie showing how they got their strength back up. Like maybe there are stormtrooper units defecting, people are rising up against the forces of tyranny. You could show why these people have been inspired, why they have hope now. Is it because they believe in Rey? Do randos all over the galaxy even know who Rey is? She walks around at Burning Man next to Chewbacca and nobody recognizes her. So why do they have this hope? Was it because of what Luke did at the end of The Last Jedi? Cause, I seem to remember that what he did was he was a ghost and people shot at him but missed because he was a ghost. Meanwhile the resistance was basically wiped out...so that's the point people were like "Yeah, you know what, I think I'll join. Back when they had a fleet and Luke was alive, I wasn't that into it, but now that it's a suicide mission just to even join, sign me up!" Instead of showing how/why anyody has hope, why people all over the galaxy suddenly decide to fight (which is like the whole point of the end of the film) insted we get video game side quests and one-linery quips.

So the fact that the rebellion is basically wiped out in TLJ is totally inconsequential, and even the idea of "no suicide missions" is stupid too because no matter what, when Palpy shows back up the whole fucking galaxy shows up to fight, so you're going to have basically unlimited manpower. In fact, a few suicide missions might be really helpful, like, you know, that part in The Last Jedi when the suicide mission is like the coolest visual of the movie?

Finn has a super secret he wants to tell Rey when he thinks they're dying. But then he never brings it up again in the rest of the film. Cool. His weird girlfriend, who we learned in The Last Jedi is sexually aroused by car crashes, is in this film too. She doesn't have anything to do, but she's there still.

WE gotta save Chewie! – Because he's such an important character, super vital to the rebellion, worth taking additional risks on their mission to save the entire fucking galaxy, you also need a side quest to save a geriatric wookie.

C-3PO can't translate a thing because it's illegal? Like he has to follow the laws of the Senate? Wouldn't aiding the fucking rebellion against that empire be illegal too? He's been doing that for six fucking movies. He's like Trump, committing treason on behalf of Russia on like a daily basis, but then suddenly because you need the plot to do a thing, Trump is all “Actually I can't download a movie on The Pirate Bay, that's illegal.” If 3PO can't because it's illegal...couldn't you just tell him it's legal now? In any case, the fact that his eyes turn red when he reads Sith is fucking hilarious.

Palpatines' all “my grandaughter has finally come to see me” and it's like he's in a retirement home. Hilarious.

Palpatine is force lightning-ing an entire fleet and overpowering Rey...but then she has a second lightsaber...sooo he fucked... Why is two lightsabers all it took? What if she went all Grievous and had 4 lightsabers? Totally unstoppable?

Kylo and Rey then fucking make out immediately. I laughed.

So Palpy somehow hasn't used this as a giant ambush/trap, and the good guys actually take down 1000 death star destroyers... After doing that...The First Order still exists? Like the Empire that nearly wiped the rebellion down to like 14 people in the last movie, it still exists. So uhh... Oh but its taken down all over the galaxy all at once by “people” just showing up. Question: why did none of these people show up in the last movie when they put out their distress signal? Now suddenly everyone shows up because... Because Luke inspired hope by... you know, dying to accomplish nothing? If anything, people showed up because Palpy sent out his idiotic space voicemail, telling the whole galaxy that now is the time to actually show up.

In A New Hope, some small fighters can take out the giant death star because it has a fatal flaw that was intentionally put there, then the secret of it was gotten to the rebels. They made a whole movie about it. And then, even with the knowledge of the flaw, it still takes a fucking wizard kid making a one-in-a-million shot to destroy it. They made a whole movie about that too. Also, before the attack, the small band of heroes escape the death star because the bad guys are letting them go to track them. That's right, the bad guys lay a trap and aren't just wildly incompetent.

In A New Hope 2 and now in Return of the Jedi 2, apparently just any small band of heroes with a millenium falcon and a dozen x-wings can take out just about anything . . . because. . . and can sneak in and out of gigantic enemy bases . . . because. . . And the bad guys STILL haven't learned that small fighters or a small band of heroes is a problem and build their fleets as if they are gonna go fight in the battle of Jutland.

Adam Driver is so good but has been totally wasted by this shit trilogy. Somebody cut together one good movie out of this trilogy, just telling Adam Driver's storyline.

Which, if you look back now on this trilogy...it's all ruined?

Force Awakens and the Starkiller base...well in like two years Palpatine is coming back with 1000 death stars, so who gives a shit about this one super weapon?

The Last Jedi, they kill Snoke, but who fucking cares, in like two years Palpatine is back with a 1000 death stars.

Member how Kylo in TLJ was all, "the Sith, the Jedi, let it all die. Join me." Yeah...so Palpatine has a 1000 death star destroyers, so like...the Sith be coming back baby.

They really wasted the characters. Finn, a defecting storm trooper. Then what? He has an arc in TLJ going from deserting to willing to go on a suicide mission because of his chinese girlfriend? Then in this movie... has a secret that doesn't matter...and gets a girlfriend.

Poe is barely in the first movie because they want you to think he's dead. In the second he has to learn a lesson about following orders blindly. In this movie...he...gets a girlfriend.

And in the end, "knock knock," "Who's there?"  "Rey." "Rey Who?"

"Rey Skywalker" – k, but why?

Why not Rey Organa? She was closer to Leia anyway. Why not... “Just Rey.” And say fuck all that history. Instead...Rey Skywalker. Gotta insert herself into the lineage known for producing fucking Vader and Kylo (and I guess a failure of an old man in Luke). "Just Rey" – THE END. Would have been better, but then the title wouldn't make sense. Fuck this title anyway. A New Hope makes more sense, cause the whole point is that the whole galaxy has hope and shows up to fight Palpy.

And this is the story of how they finally, in the 9th film, really, surely killed Palpatine. Probably. I mean, his ghost isn't gonna come back from that, right? Right? Because...we don't know how he came back from dying the first time...so the fact that they are all, “We definitely killed him this time! That...two lightsaber trick definitely did it. I mean last time he fell down a shaft, then exploded, and then the thing he was in exploded...but this time, the 2 light saber thing, that surely killed him for real. Let's Party!” is going to obviously remind you of Return of the Jedi, when they...did exactly the same thing? Partied thinking they killed him. They were mistaken back then though...because...Reasons. But this time, we definitely killed him for realzies.

You know who they should call to make sure? The fucking Ghostbusters. Which...

Tell me if you've heard this movie pitch before:

Star Wars 10: Ghostbusters 5