Only real issues I had with VIII was Snoke and Luke's deaths. And they are big issues.
Snoke was a wasted opportunity for an interesting character, kill him off sure but at least make it matter - backstory and motivations anyone?
Instead they hardturn him into a Palpatine parody for five minutes before he's sliced in half. Granted in Jedi we knew nothing about the Emperor, but at least he had loomed in the background since IV.
Hamill acted his ass off in this movie. He's among those few actors that can convey feelings just with his eyes, up there with Pacino and a few others. It's a shame his film career has not been as successful as he deserves, Star Wars aside. Kinda like F. Murray Abraham (Salieri in Amadeus, who at least got an oscar.) He has the vioce acting going for him tho.
Luke joins Optimus Prime back in 1986 as an interesting and loved character killed off just so that they can sell more new toys. During the final scene after he ends his astral projection the sense was that he was rejoycing in having helped his friends and sister, (and trolled Kylo) as well as joy from reopening himself to the force after decades. Great setup for a comeback further explored in IX and ending the movie on a high.
What a wasted GREAT opportunity to
continue telling a good story about a interesting and beloved character. Then instead he disintegrates on the altar of dollars, old characters gotta go to make way for new ones to sell toys of (Are people like us to blame here?
)
I wonder if this was the director's vision for the character, or if he had been called in to a big boardroom with a mouse symbol on the carpet and instructed to kill off Luke.
That being said, the scene was beautifully shot and acted. For a jedi there are definitively worse was to go then becoming one with the force like Obi-Wan and Yoda before him. Loved Yoda's little scene, for that minute or two I was fully back in my old childhood livingroom watching ESB on vhs with my mom.
I think the original trilogy is so loved partly because Lucas wanted to tell a story. Even after the dollarshower and stumbling through the prequels, still his main drive was to tell a story - and that will always resunate better with an audience then just the desire to make money.
