Ender wrote: ↑2019-04-14 11:15pm
Gandalf wrote: ↑2019-04-14 11:03pm
I'll admit I read wholly different things from those events, considering Luke acknowledges how fucked up it was for him to try and kill Ben, and the "suicides to win" moments instead being acts of sacrifice so that others could live. The difference is made pretty stark as a concept when Leia dresses down Poe at the start of the film.
"sacrifice so others have a chance" is a pretty dressing of "good things will happen if you kill yourself", similar to calling it "honor" instead of "pride". It is pretty notable that you don't see it anywhere else in the series - Luke doesn't accept death when he throws away his lightsabre, he is accepting suffering, that he will see others continue to struggle against the Emperor. When his death sentence is pronounced, he refuses to fight, but still resists, throwing up his hands in defense and begging his father for help rather than acquiescing. On Bespin he makes a leap of faith to the trash shoot rather than hurl himself to his death, Kenobi knows Vader striking him down isn't the end, and tells him as much, and notably Vader does the deed. Killing yourself being presented as having a good outcome only appears in TLJ, and it is really inappropriate.
I am also often troubled by the glorification of suicide attacks in media. But its pretty clear to me that in ESB Luke expected to die, and that it was pure luck that he didn't. And I don't see how Holdo ramming the Supremacy is all that different from that A wing pilot ramming the Executor at Endor, except that it got more screen time because Holdo was a major character. And then there's Obi-wan letting Vader cut him down...
TLJ does have a recurring motif of characters sacrificing their lives in battle, but...
Paige's suicide run is portrayed as a tragedy which, while it accomplishes the mission, leaves a grieving sister and, unless you're one of the "Poe was right" idiots, never should have happened in the first place. She is the face to all those deaths Leia demotes Poe and Holdo dismisses him for. Heck, its pretty much the only time in the franchise that a random fighter pilot's death is given much weight.
Holdo... was a last ditch manuver by someone who was already dead or worse than dead anyway (she effectively killed herself the moment she decided to remain on the Raadus). Symbolically, it was intended to show that Poe was wrong when he called her a coward, so you could take it as glorifying suicide in battle, but under the circumstances, I think it worked.
Luke's death, meanwhile is ambiguous- did he go in knowing he was going to die, or was it simply a risk that he acccepted? It also obviously echoes Obi-wan's and Yoda's deaths.
And the motif is subverted at the end, when Rose refuses to let Finn carry out a suicide attack (which doubtless ties back to her sister's death, and not wanting to lose someone else she cares about under such circumstances).
Ender wrote: ↑2019-04-14 10:51pm
Gandalf wrote: ↑2019-04-14 10:42pm
I'd be fascinated to know from where you get those lessons in TLJ.
the entire thing of everytime someone tries to do something bold it goes badly, Luke's attempt to murder Ben being presented in a morally grey stance, and Paige and Holdo's suicides to win moves.
In no way is Luke's attempt to kill Ben portrayed as in any way ambiguous. And even calling it an attempt is stretching it, given that if you believe Luke's account of events, it was a momentary impulse that he would not have followed through on (which I'm inclined to believe because the only alternate account is from the highly unstable Kylo, and let's be honest- if Luke truly wanted to kill that incompetent, and took him off-guard and sleeping, do you really think he would have lost?)
In any case, Luke's actions are portrayed as his greatest mistake, something which destroys a young man in his care, leads to the destruction of all his other students and his family, and which he spends the rest of his life bitterly regretting. That's not "grey", that's "This was a horrible fucking mistake and he should never have done it".
Ender wrote: ↑2019-04-14 11:06pm
Gandalf wrote: ↑2019-04-14 10:42pm
I'd be fascinated to know from where you get those lessons in TLJ.
or if you were asking where TLJ presents the usual star wars lessons about radical vulnerability, rejecting anger and fear, and trust and hope being greater than past hurts, the closest it comes is Luke's face off against Kylo. But largely I would agree it doesn't really address those morals, which is why it is such a break from the rest of the series.
It also kind of touches on the prequel message about beware the greed of big business leading to war and tyranny, but that message wasn't executed well in the prequels or TLJ
TLJ can be a bit difficult to parse, due to its heavy use (arguably overuse) of subversion and misdirection, but most of those themes are there to some extent.
The importance of rejecting anger and fear can be seen in how Luke's anger and fear destroyed Ben, and in how Luke has to overcome his regret (as I would interpret it, his fear of his own failure) to be a hero again. And in how Rey's insecurities about her past and identity lead to her being manipulated. And, for a non-Force user example, how Poe's fears lead to him fucking everything up spectacularly.
Of course, we also see fear arguably driving Leia's and Rose's actions, and its much less negatively-portrayed (Rose saving Finn at the end, Leia's reluctance to let anyone else die), so its a bit open to interpretation.
But pretty much the entire point of the ending is restoring hope, even in the worst of circumstances.
Edit: You can also argue that Paige's death doesn't qualify as a suicide attack, because from what I recall, by the time she died releasing the bombs, her ship was already crippled. She wasn't making it out of there alive. All she did was die in a manner that would give her death some meaning.