A Sense of Familiarilty
If theres one thing that I hope The Last Jedi isn’t that is it being the same as something we’ve seen before. The biggest complaint people have about The Force Awakens is that it’s the same as A New Hope. The story beats are pretty similar between the two, right up to the Death Star and Starkiller Base comparisons. One of the many things that i thought Disney did well with The Force Awakens was keeping it familiar when they could’ve easily done something very different that might not of felt Star Wars enough.
The Force Awakens being similar to A New Hope meant that fans got an easy push back into Star Wars films instead of a jolt like The Phantom Menace had. The Phantom Menace was so different to the original trilogy that fans immediately thought it felt strange and weird because the dull dialogue and too different characters…Jar Jar Binks. The Force Awakens was similar to A New Hope whilst also introducing new blood into the mixture of the old cast. This mixture has now created a solid cast that can stand on it’s own, not because of the help of the older more famous cast members but because like the original trilogy they are all one big happy family.
The Force Awakens unfortunately, and fortunately, ends up setting up more questions than giving actual answers as to what is happening in the Star Wars universe. The amount of theories and questions have never been so high in Star Wars as everyone for the last two years have been thinking of questions like who is Snoke? Who is Rey’s parents? What happened to Luke Skywalker? Why did Luke go into hiding? And my biggest question where did Maz Kanata get Luke’s lightsaber from?
These questions would simply infuriate fans of other film franchises but Star Wars fans love it and it creates something that people won’t expect in The Last Jedi. A lot of people are under the impression that it will just be a remake of Empire Strikes Back but I believe that all the set up and similarity in Force Awakens sets up The Last Jedi to be different from anything we’ve seen before. Rian Johnson is the first person other than George Lucas to write and direct a Star Wars movie and he must have one hell of a story if Disney are going to put that much trust into him.
In the end The Force Awakens is a great film that does exactly what it needs to do and it does it well. The Force Awakens could’ve easily been the next The Phantom Menace but the team at Disney played their cards well and set everything up in place to create what could be another amazing trilogy. I can’t wait to see what J.J Abrams can do when he is let off the leash a little for episode 9 and the reveals in The Last Jedi should hopefully be worth the a familar feeling movie that The Force Awakens was.