this post was submitted on 11 Dec 2025
807 points (87.8% liked)
Comic Strips
20646 readers
3556 users here now
Comic Strips is a community for those who love comic stories.
The rules are simple:
- The post can be a single image, an image gallery, or a link to a specific comic hosted on another site (the author's website, for instance).
- The comic must be a complete story.
- If it is an external link, it must be to a specific story, not to the root of the site.
- You may post comics from others or your own.
- If you are posting a comic of your own, a maximum of one per week is allowed (I know, your comics are great, but this rule helps avoid spam).
- The comic can be in any language, but if it's not in English, OP must include an English translation in the post's 'body' field (note: you don't need to select a specific language when posting a comic).
- Politeness.
- AI-generated comics aren't allowed.
- Adult content is not allowed. This community aims to be fun for people of all ages.
Web of links
- !linuxmemes@lemmy.world: "I use Arch btw"
- !memes@lemmy.world: memes (you don't say!)
founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
The problem isn't female leads, it' trash-tier writing. Like introducing a self-conscious stormtrooper and then having him unemotionally kill his mates pretty much immediately. Or introducing a nobody and then make her the child of a somehow™️ returned supervillain. Or having your minor villain and your female lead fall in love and then having them pretty much just revert back to where they were before. Or replacing the Death Star with an intergalactic Death Shotgun. The list goes on
It was lack of common direction through the trilogy. JJ set up his signature mystery boxes in the first movie, only for Rian to ignore those and leave nothing to work with for the next one.
I believe the reason why Palpatine somehow returned was because Rian killed off Snoke, and they really needed some big baddie Kylo and Rey could team up against so Kylo could have his redemption arc.
i much prefer where rian johnson was going, even though the main plot was meh. he left so many open plot threads that tied into the old eu that they could have used, but then jj went back to his first idea.
What plot threads? People keep repeating that TLJ opened possibilities but no one can explain what possibilities it actually opened.
You wanted Rey and Kylo Ren to kiss in the next movie? We saw that happen and it sucked. What other possibilities did it open?
JJ choosing to ignore the second movie doesn't mean "nothing was left". Baring the bizarre casino, TLJ was the most interesting SW story since RotS. Episode IX could've been an amazing finale coming out of that, but JJ did what JJ always does and absolutely failed to deliver.
*Also, I feel it's important to point out the "Mystery Box" was and is bullshit, lazy writing. Yes, it's important to leave things in a story for the audience to wonder about and anticipate. That's not a valid excuse to throw esoteric shit at the wall and call it a day. The audience doesn't need to know where the plot is going, but the fucking writer should. JJ left Rian with hollow shell of "intrigue" with nothing substantial, got pissy when Rian did what he wanted with that, then shit out a boring finale trying to reverse everything back.
What was set up for the last movie?
Nothing new was set up for the grand finale. No new conflicts or threats to look forward to.
Compare with Empire Strikes Back. A bigger villain has been revealed. Han has been captured. Darth Vader is revealed to be Luke’s father. Romance between Han and Leia. Lots of exciting new threads for the final movie.
TLJ had nothing of that. When I went out of the theater I had no excitement at all for the next movie.
Right, "nothing".
Even a subpar writer could've done plenty with half of that, but JJ and Disney got scared and shit out the blandest finale possible.
No. Stop comparing the new to the old, especially at such a minuscule, beat-for-beat level. Not only does that kill any possible innovation, it's a nostalgia trap and exactly why VII and IX were so fucking boring. Nothing will replicate the feelings had watching beloved movies for the first time, and expecting anything to match that is just an excuse to be dismissive of it.
The resistance was not on their back foot, they were fucking dead. It was 30 some people and the Falcon by the end of TLJ.
Kylo makes a terrible villain for the big bad. He already lost to Rey in the first movie even if weakened. He failed to turn Rey with his big join me speech in TLJ, and he gets embarrassed by ghost Luke. There's nothing scary about someone who's been throwing temper tantrums for basically two entire movies. Secondly, there was now way he wasn't going to end up being good, Disney wasn't going to greenlight a conclusion with him being evil.
Rey made peace with her past and admitted it didn't matter, there's nothing to explore there without the retcon Rise did. She also had multiple defining moments of choosing the light, basing a movie on yet another time is stupid.
Other force sensitive people is a meaningless thing to base the conclusion of a trilogy on. Elmer Sleazebaggano son of Elan appearing and being the big good or bad out of nowhere is just as bad as Palpatine. You could do something with an established character becoming force sensitive, but they butchered that anyway.
Leia even if Fisher hadn't passed couldn't be the main plot. Sure she could be a source of help or counsel for Rey, but that's about it. If Leia became the hero of the resistance like she was for the rebellion by using the force and welding a lightsaber it just begs the question why she didn't bother at any point in the last 20 years before everyone was dead. It also doesn't work with Disney's need to sunset the established character is and bring out the new heroes of the galaxy.
It's not about comparing the feelings of empire or the beat for beat replay. It's about comparing the narrative and where it was at that point in the story. Empire left room for growth, there were new questions to answer, TLJ didn't.
After Force Awakens I had the following questions:
It doesn’t take much imagination how to make an exciting follow up with these open threads. TLJ decided that none of these threads matters and went in a completely different direction.
The only question I had after TLJ was:
Much weaker way to build up for the grand finale.
Why? The sequel trilogy is doing itself all the time. So why shouldn't we?
Aren't these also Star Wars movies? Set in the Star Wars universe?
The shot of the kid with the broom left me so hopeful for all the new things I thought were coming. All the retreading that Episode 9 did left me disappointed.
This was done better in ESB.
Who cares? We have no idea who Snoke was. Because of this there's nothing to indicate Kylo Ren is doing anything different than Snoke would've done. There's zero perceptible change because they didn't bother to spend any time defining the First Order or Snoke.
I always assume there's other force users across the galaxy all of the time. I think you're taking the things you see in a Star Wars movie to be 100% of the events that happen in that Galaxy. For those of us that take it as some of the more interesting stories coming from this massive galaxy of who knows how many people (trillions? quintiliions?) that scene is meaningless. Like, yeah that's always happening, all of the time. I generally assume that there are many Jedi out there. The movie is calling itself "The Last Jedi" to present the galaxy as something narrow (which is stupid because Leia would be a Jedi FFS, just another thing they would need to fix later) just so you will think it's interesting to broaden something presented to as being something narrow. It was never narrow, it was only TLJ that attempted to present Star Wars as something narrow. it was always broad, nothing new happened when they suggested it was broader than only TLJ presented it to be earlier in the movie.
Why wouldn't we? First of all TLJ is just ESB and RoTJ thrown into a blender with the point of all of the plot lines they re-hashed removed. Benicio Del Tor is Lando. Kylo Ren kills the old evil guy like Darth Vader did. They have to blow up a super laser. There's AT ATs walking across a white plain. Ah, but it's different because TLJ's version of Lando doesn't learn anything? It's different because Kylo Ren doesn't change? It's different because they fail to blow up the super laser? It's different because the AT ATs are walking on salt instead of snow? Sorry, but it's the same kinda shit just without any point to it. Which makes it boring to anyone familiar with the movies it's clumsily copy and pasting from.
RoS is way more interesting than TLJ. There's at least a point to it, at least it wasn't just blindly copy and pasting things from better movies without even understanding them.
The Last Jedi wasn't interesting. It was one piece of wasted potential after another.
We got what looked like the start of what could've been the best buddy friendship in The Force Awakens, only for The Last Jedi to completely ignore that potential.
It turned Finn into a coward, then forced a character he had no chemistry with onto him.
The casino arc was this attempt at rolling in some sort of... Message...? As if we don't already know about neutral profiteers like The Banking Clan. And then it still only pays minor lip service to this message.
Captain Phasma was completely useless. Snoke was completely useless. Luke Skywalker could've been an interesting direction, but nothing was done with him and then he died after one cool moment.
It had scenes and direction that made absolutely no logical sense, even internally. Such as slow as shit bombers getting completely wasted when only one was actually needed. A complete lack in competent leadership causing a mutiny, which would've been interesting if it was meant that way, but it's not. Deus Ex Rose dooming her comrades.
Worst part about the sequels was the compulsive need to regurgitate elements of the prior series.
There's so much lore from the books and the games and the toys and the cutting room floor of the original movies. And they had a ton of good ideas at the outset. A storm trooper who defects? A six foot tall super trooper in mirror armor? A Sith Lord who isn't stoic and morose, but hot headed and self-destructive? These are cool good ideas!
Shame they got drowned out in Disney fueled nostalgia.
A thousand times this. People hate bad female actors not because they are female but because they are bad actors.
Kal el no
Sometimes, but more often bad writing can make a great actress look like a bad female actor.
Natalie Portman can act, but those prequels were rough on her reputation. The camp value od the prequels wasn't immediately apparent and it was rough on her.
I remember someone saying that they thought Ewan McGregor and Liam Neesan were great, and the response was 'yeah, in Trainspotting and Schindlers list.'
Some people just hate women and they suck, but often the something with a female lead just sucks. It sucks that the former complicates the latter.
I'll note that the exact same thing happened to Hayden Christensen. His reputation took a big hit for being the guy who portrayed Anakin Skywalker. He was in the same boat Natalie Portman was and weathered the same storm. The older actors were able to weather it better because they'd had successful projects prior, the younger actors didn't have that.
Here's the problem with the Strong Female Character^(R)^: They are never found in movies made out of genuine creative vision. A Strong Female Character^(R)^ is always the lead character in a movie whose production has been authorized for the purposes of monetizing an intellectual property the studio has rights to that polling data shows would be popular among the 18-24 demographic within the next 16 months, and the writers and casting directors are hereby ordered to pander to the attached list of races, genders and sexual orientations as per the company Never Offend Anyone Ever policy.
Movies that were made to bring a cool idea to life tend to have better characters in them, because their characteristics are story telling devices and not business decisions. Stunt casting is ALWAYS a business decision.
Wasn't the woman from the Twilight movies accused of being a terrible actress and it nearly ruined her career, until she started getting other roles and her reputation turned right around. She even commented on it saying "Yeaaaah.. Bella was a garbage nothing of a character. I did everything they asked of me, she's just that terrible."
Kristen Stewart I think her name was?
Both the leads had that problem.
True but it was a bigger problem for her because when a woman is seen as doing something wrong, it is seen as ten times as bad as what a man does.
Unless it's a sex crime, in which case she's largely ignored....
Or abuse
All modern societies were built on the understanding that women are inherently inferior to men.
Once you understand that, so much begins to make sense.
Male domestic abuse victims are laughed at because to our patriarchy, a woman is not a person but a thing to be conquered. If a man is abused by a woman, it means he failed to "conquer her" and should be mocked for his inability.
Feminism is not the solution to this problem for it is an inherently misandrist and transphobic principle. Feminism is predicated on the idea that men are not people, but predators, vicious animals who prey on women. It teaches that the man must be tamed and kept away from women at all costs for her safety.
This is why feminists hate transpeople for it sees transwomen as not fellow sisters, but the male predator using mimicry to blend in with its prey.
Only true egalitarianism will work, and that is a society that lifts women out of oppression without demonizing men. A system that allows transpeople to be who we say we are.
I just got banned from r/menslib a leftist sub about mens issues. While I feel you do paint to broad of a picture of feminism as there are many who support trans and take mens issues seriously cannot disagree with you on how the way we talk about gender being absolutely toxic and damaging to its own cause. It treats all other liberal mens subs like the enemy and feminist subs that absolutely hate it as allies.
And when you, as a man, try to explain what pushes boys away from the left they just shrug and say patriarchy/entitlement/capitalism instead of really talking it. And when they acutaly do talk about stuff like male abuse victims its often about how it makes men more dangerous.
I swear that sub would support Noam over Mamdani
Lemmy could probably do it better. But I not the person to do it.
We will not win men back to the left until we admit that young men are guilty until proven innocent... but young men will be assumed guilty until proven innocent as long as women feel unsafe around them...
So both problems need to be solved at once.
I am not heartless or believe that women don't have reason to fear men.
I mean men think that being friend zoned is a tragedy? How must that poor woman feel thinking that she had just made a valued friend and all along he only saw her as a hole.
We cannot get Egalitarianism until we solve the problem of men and women not feeling safe around one another. And I don't know how to fix that.
Men are scared they'll be labeled monsters if a social interaction goes badly women are scared that they are being seen as a living fucktoy with no other purpose but to be fucked... and it's hard to convince either group they're wrong because neither one is.
And the worst part is as a trans woman. I have the worst of both worlds, am I going to be seen as a fuck, a felon, a freak, or a friend? Because I legit cannot tell how another person sees me.
Yeah, I never even noticed "Kal el no" in the movie when I watched it. But it's a meme, so we all have to pile on about something completely forgettable being the worst thing ever!
That's how this shit works. Just short clips about nothing burgers turned into memes and made to loom large in your mind as being something egregious.
No, she really is a bad actress. But the biggest problem people have with her isn't "Kal-el no", it's "Bibi yes!"
Or having a beloved character die off screen
Or faking a death and undoing the fakeout within a couple of minutes.
The other problem is that there were 2 death stars in the original trilogy and another one in the sequels. Like, think of something new, will you?
I'm honestly not even mad at that. What broke my immersion was how everyone was just flat out stunned that they would try it a third time, and with no defensive countermeasures whatsoever. They were caught off guard a third time
And that third time they figured out how to bend space lasers to hit every planet at once and auto win
Come on
Sir, another death star has hit the big screens.
South park has an entire season about this. They basically tried to make the new Star Wars as nostalgic as possible to people who liked the original trilogy.
Wait you mean rebels are gone and the empire too? Let’s do resistance vs first order then. Let’s make a planet that’s almost the same as tatooine. A villain that’s almost the same as Vader, with a similar ending. And the list goes on. Hell let’s even bring a quick force heal (previously unheard of/impossible) from someone who’s totally untrained. That’ll teach em.
But imo the most frustrating part was when Rey at the end decided that she was a Skywalker. Like, what??? They could have made it end with “Rey who? Just Rey” to mean that we aren’t defined by out family’s actions, but instead she decided she belonged to someone’s family she hardly knows.