Re: Star Wars: Episode IX - December 20, 2019
I know the ST is set up to introduce new characters and they only included the OT characters to get butts in the seats and to pass the torch but I can't help feeling like they were wasted entirely. I know there was no way to get Harrison to do more than one movie but Fisher wasn't that bad (better in TLJ than FA) and Hamill is perfect to watch. They should've been in it more. We'll never get these characters back together again and to waste the opportunity seems so terrible. For all three of them to never even be in the same room together? Even the moment with Luke and Leia at the end of TLJ feels off because he isn't *really* there.
Hamill really came out best to me. I really don't like how HF has aged - I don't mean his physical looks, but what was once a lovable gruff cynic has somehow morphed with age into something much less likable or relatable. And CF I'm certain perhaps had a minor stroke, or had more plastic surgery than believed because her face just wasn't moving properly and it impacted her voice too (and its remarkable that CF lost weight and was presented as about as polished as she could be.) And age isn't the answer - Streep is much older than CF was.
Hamill I think has improved greatly with age - the whiny-voiced golly-gosh actor that they cut around in ESB is gone and he has weight and charisma onscreen. I like how his rugged face looks onscreen, especially when he lost weight for the role. As I've said before, even at his age right now (and he looks great for his age) I could see a darker Luke jedi movie (tonally more like Rogue One) with Hamill at its center.
But no, the "journey" of the wonderous, boring Rey and her fascinating partners-in-crime Kylo and Maz and Hux (oh, totally forgot to mention Poe and Finn - wonder how that happened?) will play on and on as Hamill ages out, with Disney likely glad to be rid of him for trolling their products on Twitter, then "apologizing."
Honestly, after TLJ, I'm beginning to feel like the ST has evolved into a calamity on the scale of the PT. Not because they are poorly written and acted like the PT, but because they squandered the last productive years of the OT principals with a "Star Wars for a new generation" mantra - when most of the audience was in fact older fans who in truth only wanted to see new characters because they were interacting with the classic characters.
I wish Disney luck with that new Rian-with-no-OT-characters-or-story trilogy - because as Han would say - "you're gonna need it."
