I don't particularly hate TLJ, but I think the movie is not well done, to me, and I think I had different references for. I think they could've stood to have Rey be Luke's daughter and structure a story about the burden of legacy in TLJ. Lord willing, these are the ideas that God blessed me with:
First, an exploration of backstory:
I don’t fully mind what they did with Luke. In concept I like it, but I think there’s things left out that could round out the character and explore his characterization and reasons for his actions. Luke began a new jedi order. He married Mara Jade, they have a daughter, Rey, but then the emergence of a new dark side force begins, the first order rises and Luke doesn't understand why this has happened again. Anakin destroyed the sith. It should be over. While I don’t know if I’d go for this, but Mara Jade is killed in battle defending her daughter in the midst of a raid by the first order, maybe even the Knights Of Ren do it.
Luke, tormented by this, furiously digs for information about why this has begun again, and finds out the meaning of it, that the balance is a cycle, not a single event. When he senses the dark side in Ben, senses Snoke’s influence, he feels it all happen again, the fall of the jedi, the rise of the empire, the destruction of the family he has left. In that moment of fear and pain, shaken by the perception of his family being destroyed by a rise of another Vader, he allows his fear to drive him, and considers killing his nefew, maybe even in a way to almost spare him the pain that his future could bring him, taking out his lightsaber, but not igniting it, realizing that it would be wrong to do, maybe even seeing his robot hand, reminding him of the events of ROTJ.
But Ben senses that and lashes out in rage. The new jedi order is burned, his daughter gone, her dead he thinks and his powers gone. Luke sees this as almost the force punishing him for what he did. Casting out those remaining, among them a partner in his training Lor San Tekka, sending R2D2 with him.
Luke himself not realizing that Ben had taken Rey, feeling tempted to kill her to avoid a threat to his rightful Skywalker lineage, but being unable to kill his cousin, he wiped her mind of any training she’d gotten by Luke and abandoned her on Jakku. Lor San Tekka discovered Rey and that’s why he was there and was willing to reveal the map to Luke at this time. He believed the knowledge of his daughter being alive, would reignite the spark of hope inside him, a message he never had the chance to relay to Poe, before the first order attacked. Han considered this to be the case as well after meeting her and Leia sensed it after they met as well. Kylo began to see it after hearing about it.
Luke over the course of the movie does grow to rediscover his goals by the end. Through finding out that Rey is his daughter and connecting to her and admitting what he did with Ben, feeling like he's disconnected from the force as a punishment, seeing him considering killing Ben as not much different than what Vader had done when killing the younglings. He sees his 2nd chance in Rey. But this is hurt when Rey discovers that Luke didn't try to find her after she was taken. Luke is in shame by this, as Rey leaves. Luke is then confronted by either Yoda or Obi-Wan (or both), who explain to him that he's seen Vader in himself and thus saw his failure as if he would be like him, saying that Luke has lost sight of what made him him, and it wasn't being a jedi. Them telling him the folly of not seeing his own humanity, underneath being a jedi, confronting him with truth of what happened to Padme, who Luke has no memories of and hasn't connected with (seeing only the Vader/Anakin in himself), telling him that they sensed in her that the children were beginning to die in the womb, but she gave up every ounce of life force she had left to keep alive, in spite of not being a jedi or force sensitive. In the midst of this Luke realizes that he cut himself off from the force in his shame and self loathing, he wasn't being punished. He reaches through the force and out to Padme, seeing her after she's given birth to him, even in the present feeling the touch of her energy on his face, seeing her and Anakin. Luke resolves to go after Rey.
Leia still grieves for the loss of Han, but almost refuses to see her son as gone, this building to her outright attacking a first order village raid to try and lure Kylo to them, her confronting Kylo and practically daring him to kill her. He can't. But Kylo is forced to bring Leia to Snoke. We'd also develop Leia having trained as a jedi with Luke.
Rey was never raised, to her knowledge, with the idea of what potential she had. Into adulthood, she's confronted and dragged into that potential. After meeting Luke, she thinks he must've left her on Jakku. But Kylo, still through their link, tells her that he didn't do that and that he took her to kill her, but couldn't. Now, after discovering the pain and loss that comes with being a Skywalker, to the point of feeling abandoned and betrayed by Luke, her dad. After finding out that Luke didn't come looking for her, out of fear of finding her dead, she lashes out at him, angry and hurt, feeling abandoned and betrayed, telling him he has nothing to teach her. Then hunting down Kylo for the death of Han and Finn being hurt.
On the flipside there's Ben, someone who was raised in the Skywalker family, with knowledge of his potential, of his legacy, the idea that his bloodline has potential power that he thinks is his birthright, but it's just out of his reach, and he becomes bitter and feels cheated out of what he sees as rightfully his. And when tempted by the darkside, he doesn't choose to resist, seeing it as his way to get the true power of a Skywalker. He could resent Han for being normal, a mere pilot, seeing him as apart of his weakness. After killing his dad, his pain is crippling, something he takes out on his fodder, in the midst of his final training with Snoke. This grows to a rage and resentment against Snoke and the first order, as he and the Knights Of Ren are used as a weapon to invade worlds and plunder children, and particularly after Snoke forces Kylo to bring Leia to him.
Finn may be more committed to Rey, but he himself also has begun to see what these people are dying for, and does decide to help Poe and the resistance, when Leia gets herself captured as a way for them to pinpoint a location of Snoke. Helping them break into a stormtrooper training facility to use their network to track Kylo's ship to Snoke, them seeing children being taken by the first order, and him deciding to try and help them, only to fail when Phasma, rather than let the kids go free, has some of them killed. Leading to Finn seeing the unfortunate side effect of caring, the pain of failure and loss. Him reacting badly to this and in a rage hunting down and killing Phasma.
With Poe, detail his backstory as almost someone with a death wish, whose looking to die in a blaze of glory in his mind. His parents, former rebels, killed by the last remnants of the empire, him becoming someone who doesn't get particularly attached. His arc being him finding something to live for, instead of die for, as he and Finn try and rescue the children taken to be indoctrinated by the first order. When pinned in some rubble, he cuts his hand off to ensure, he can protect the children and secure their way out.
All of these plots begin to converge on Snoke's ship. Leia is brought to Snoke by Ben. But Leia shocked to discover that Snoke is a force projection.
In a reveal, we'd see that Ben, seeking the power he felt he deserved as a Skywalker, tapped into the dark side and in mental disconnection, it has manifested itself as Snoke, the darkest parts of Ben's mind given life by the dark side energy he'd absorbed.
It pushes Kylo to kill Leia, as she tries to reach him. He lashes out in a rage and kills the Snoke manifestation, taking it into himself and taking in all the power of the dark side.
Rey charges Kylo in her rage, and tries to kill him, but Kylo defeats her. His powers outmatching hers, tossing her off to the Knights. Luke arrives in time, brandishing his green light saber, facing Kylo and (though this is more a suggestion) but Luke taking Anakin's lightsaber and passing it off to Leia, to assist. As Rey steals one of the Knights weapons and tries to fight them off. Them both battling Kylo and trying to reach him. Kylo exclaiming that he's building a legacy, beyond the Skywalkers now. Luke and Leia firing back that all he is another dark sider leading a stormtrooper army.
Kylo, realizing they're right, uses his powers to turn all the ships of the first order on eachother, stating a new path, "No more stormtroopers, no more death stars, no more empire." Making the statement of the dark side being the only thing left, and using the ships weapons to destroy eachother, even Snoke's ship, Kylo casually protecting himself from the destruction. Rey is the first the recover and tries to catch Kylo off guard, who stomps her, wounds her and in a petty slash of vengeance, slices the lightsaber over Rey's left eye, blinding her in it and scarring her. He lifts his lightsaber up and brings it down as a final blow, but Leia takes the hit for Rey. Kylo, for all his villainy, is still enraged at this and tears the already damaged ship apart in his pain and anger. This allows Luke and Rey to escape with a dying Leia. (I did this in the hindsight of Carrie's passing.)
Leia tells Luke she knows what happened and she forgives him. Luke apologizing for Han and what he did, promising he won't give up again. Rey, devestated at what she sees as her fault, tries to help, refuses to believes there isn't a way. Luke holds her off, her crying, as she apologizes to Leia. Who simply reminds her that they all make mistakes and apart of her believes her son isn't gone. Luke reaffirming that with the no one's ever really gone line. And with that Leia peacefully passes away.
And with that we end the movie:
Luke having re-established his goal of heroism and maybe even left as a resistance leader.
Poe, seeing himself as having found something to live for.
Finn being driven by a desire for revenge upon any remnants of the FO.
And Rey, as she stands out in front of the forcefield of the x-wing bay, in the starship, over looking an ocean of stars, holding Anakin's lightsaber. She, in a rejection of the Skywalker legacy and the pain and death that comes with it, throws the lightsaber into space.
The movie ending on her standing in front of that ocean of stars.
THE END
Please review and tell me what you think!