THREAD: @RobertIger & @Disney should concerned w/their investment in @Lucasfilm & how it may hurt their business going forward. It's hard to categorize the level of failure @rianjohnson achieved w/The Last Jedi. In his defense tho, @Disney & @Lucasfilm allowed him
to do this by making the unconscionable decision to make a trilogy w/o a treatment set in stone. Sure the story can organically change as you progress, much like a TV series, you add or remove elements but you fit them into the overall story & it only stays if it helps THE story.
If you look at TLJ & TFA side by side it’s hard to imagine that they fit in the same universe, let alone the same storyline. While TFA wasn’t perfect, it gave TLJ open plot lines that fans were eager to follow. Instead,
all of those plot lines were tossed aside by @rianjohnson & @Lucasfilm & replaced w/what they believed was a better story. It’s a terrible idea to not have the trilogy mapped out because the story ends up looking juvenile at best, the simplest example in the @Disney Star Wars is
the scene carrying from TFA to TLJ, when Rey meets Luke. If Luke had, as @rianjohnson decided, given up completely on the Jedi order, then why in the world is he dressed in his traditional Jedi outfit when Rey arrives? What, did Rey just happen to show up on laundry day?
Did Luke just say, “Well the caretakers are washing all of my ponchos & pants, so might as well throw on the old Jedi outfit if I want any blue milk today.” Then the story delves into creating things that weren’t there, i.e. Leia had at best shown a sensitivity to the force but
never acted on it, yet when she’s in space (where according to Bodhi in Rogue One she’d be “Annihilated in the cold, dark vacuum of space”) she’s not only alive but she suddenly has the power to force pull herself to safety.
If she could pull that off w/o training, then why couldn’t a powerful force user like say, Emperor Palpatine, be able to force pull himself back up to the ledge Darth Vader threw him over in ROTJ? Then from a basic storytelling standpoint, there is
the completely pointless Canto Bight subplot. When telling a story, if a scene does not move the narrative forward then it is pointless. If the script for TLJ had been written by an aspiring screenwriter & handed to studio execs, it would have been laughed at internally &
shredded in front of the authors eyes. Not to mention, why would Poe be kept out of the loop for the rescue plan they were executing? What is he like 12 & can’t keep a secret? In what scenario does he say anything other than, “Oh that’s a good idea”. There are countless more
examples, but in all it was sloppy storytelling at best. Stories have been sloppy before, looking at you TPM’s trade federation, but it stayed true to its story & fans had a pretty non-divisive response to them. What @Disney @Lucasfilm & @rianjohnson have done is
make a non-compelling story that is either enjoyed by the crowd that would be happy w/anything as long as it was fun at the theater, or despised by the fans that drive the long term success of the Star Wars brand. The biggest issue TLJ created for @Disney is apathy, as proved by
the lack of repeat viewings of TLJ in theaters (losing them roughly $700MM) the abysmal Home Video numbers for TLJ & the Solo disaster. Say what you will about #BoycottSolo, but the fans didn’t boycott because of a movement created online to prove a point, they boycotted because
they are no longer interested in the story @Disney is telling w/Star Wars. Apathy is what can kill @Disney’s investment in @Lucasfilm. If you go to a @DisneyPark & see who’s at the Jedi Training Academy attractions you’ll see a bunch of kids there enjoying the experience, but
ultimately they’d enjoy that as much as the next attraction, instead look at the parents taking pictures & enjoying it more than the kids. They’re there because they wanted to share their love of Star Wars w/their children which
ensures a legion of future consumers waiting to gladly hand @Disney their money for anything Star Wars. Now that half of the fans, the more fanatic half mind you, essentially don’t care about @Disney’s version of Star Wars it’s put their investment in @Lucasfilm in jeopardy. Now
@Lucasfilm is painting people who disliked TLJ w/a broad brush as racist/sexist/bigots. This is not only a bad business practice, it’s also untrue. Take Kelly Marie Tran for example, when the first photos of her character surfaced I was excited &
thought she was some badass pilot, who maybe was going to give Poe a run for his money as best pilot in the resistance. Instead she was handed a terrible character, not her fault, @rianjohnson’s. I’d love to see KMT’s Rose have a better role.
Same goes for @JohnBoyega's Finn & Daisy Ridley's Rey, loved them in TFA but in TLJ they were one dimensional boring characters. Liking characters has nothing to do w/Race/Gender/etc but everything to do with, if its an interesting character. They’ve lost their way from
the hero archetypes that made the OT so great. If you have the hero archetype it doesn’t matter what the actor looks or sounds like, everyone can identify
w/that character because, well, see the definition: “The archetypal hero appears in all religions, mythologies, & epics of the world. They are an expression of our personal & collective unconscious.” i.e. Whatever background you come from you will identify w/this character.
@Disney needs 2 get back to this type of good storytelling in order to stop damaging their investment in @Lucasfilm. I believe the best way to do this is to scrap TLJ & remake it, which is why I’ve offered to cover the production budget for @Disney in order 2 make this a reality.
The plan has been drawn out to be remade & keep Carrie Fisher in the film, which is a MUST for us, & we’ll honor her character & performance. The plan requires @Disney to put on hold the @Lucasfilm titles in development starting w/Episode IX, but it will pay dividends for
them in the long run. I believe it’s something Disney should consider for many reasons, but also it’s no coincidence Comcast has suddenly challenged @Disney for Fox. A clear plan laid out showing how Star Wars films are going to return to being
the cash cows they once were will go a long way towards tipping the scale. The ball is in their court to save the franchise & get back to doing what makes the most money, telling great stories w/great characters. We’ll fund it, if they’ll let us... #RemakeTheLastJedi #StarWars
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