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PaperclipPerfector  1d ago (text post)   5065 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of November 17, 2025

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I think Holdo was supposed to be incompetent. Why are all the rebel leaders in Star Wars so good at their jobs? Real militaries are full of idiots who get their jobs through political connections, and rebel forces even more so. Her strange appearance ("admiral purple hair") also suggests this. The movie is just being realistic here- an incompetent person is placed in high rank for political reasons ("the force is female!") and disaster ensues

This is hilarious. Otherwise I'm not sure if I agree, although I like this flavor of Star Wars cope. @hanikrummihundursvin put it perfectly.

I'm half-convinced of a theory by Adam Roberts - Holdo has to be incompetent because the narrative logic of the film demands it. We want to see the heroes pull out victories against impossible odds, the more impossible the odds the more dramatic the victory, and at some point that requires incompetence from the commanding officers who got the heroes into that terrible situation in the first place.

On the other hand - in the original trilogy, nothing like this happens. The Rebel commanding officers in ANH, ESB, and RotJ are consistently professional, authoritative, and well-reasoned in their decision-making. If they make a bad call (and probably the only one is falling for the Emperor's trap in RotJ), it is nonetheless a bad decision that we can imagine a sensible person making, given what they knew at the time. If we look at how the background Rebels behave at Yavin, Hoth, or Endor, they are generally calm, reliable, and seem to know what they're doing. They seem like people you would trust to have at your back. So clearly it's possible to tell a dramatic story in this genre, where the heroes win a desperate victory against overwhelming odds, without incompetent commanders.

On the other other hand, though... that works in the OT, at least in part, because the villains of the OT are credible and intimidating. The OT has Tarkin, Vader, and Emperor Palpatine to work with, all of whom are convincingly threatening. The films never undermine their villains. The Rebels might be capable professionals, but so are the Imperials. That is not the case in the ST. The sequels have devoted significant screen time to establishing that their villains are a clown show. Kylo Ren is an immature brat who establishes screen presence through mere physical violence - he's a thug, with none of Vader's presence. Hux is a resentful boob, seen quivering with impotent rage more than he is genuinely threatening people. The heroes do not take these villains seriously. In the opening scene of TLJ, the heroes ring up and sass the villains. This undermines them as threats. (Comparison: in the OT, the heroes never mock the villains. I think the closest it comes is Han referring to the Imperials as slugs. But Tarkin, Vader, or the Emperor are always treated with deathly seriousness.) So the sequel films cannot rely on the villains to establish a sense of threat. The villains are too weak, in narrative terms, to do that.

Now the obvious response here is, "Well, then they shouldn't have had awful villains." I tend to agree. But I think there's a case you can make that the ST has lame villains for a valid storytelling purpose - Kylo Ren isn't supposed to be the second coming of Darth Vader, but rather him being an insecure Vader fanboy is part of the point. Where the Empire in the OT was generally composed of mature adult men with confidence and a degree of professionalism, the First Order in the ST are insecure twenty-something alt-right imitators. Maybe the films are trying to make a point about neo-Nazis or something. Okay, sure. But if you go with that, if the films are meant as some kind of deconstruction of youths imitating the patterns of evil regimes of bygone eras, then all of the films need to support that, and they can't just re-run the plot beats of the OT.

And unfortunately they do. Even TLJ, honestly, is a pretty by-the-numbers re-run of ESB; I don't know why people think it's subversive or deconstructive. But you can't just re-run those plot beats while changing the things that made them work in the first place. Re-running the OT can work and produce a genuinely beloved Star Wars story - the original Knights of the Old Republic is just a straight OT re-run and everybody loves it - but it has to be done with more skill than went into the ST.

I found the "ring up and sass the villains" part broke the illusion for me just a couple of minutes into the movie, and it was downhill from there (dropping bombs like a B-17, really?). The idea that prank calls were relevant (or that secure authenticated comms wouldn't be expected) a long time ago in a galaxy far away was way too far, IMO.

(Comparison: in the OT, the heroes never mock the villains. I think the closest it comes is Han referring to the Imperials as slugs. But Tarkin, Vader, or the Emperor are always treated with deathly seriousness.)

No. Leia sassed Tarkin in the original film:

LEIA: Governor Tarkin. I should have expected to find you holding Vader's leash; I recognised your foul stench when I was brought on board.

TARKIN: Charming, to the last. You don't know how hard I found it, signing the order to terminate your life.

LEIA: I'm surprised you had the courage to take the responsibility yourself.

In ESB Luke sasses Vader at the beginning of their fight (though, of course, this is specifically him being a headstrong idiot):

VADER: You have learned much, young one.

LUKE: You'll find that I'm full of surprises.

And in RotJ Han sasses Jabba on a couple of occasions (though, of course, Jabba is not an Imperial):

THREEPIO: His High Exaltedness, the great Jabba the Hutt, has decreed that you are to be terminated immediately.

HAN: Good. I hate long waits.

[...]

THREEPIO: Victims of the almighty Sarlacc, His Excellency hopes that you will die honorably. But should any of you wish to beg for mercy, the great Jabba the Hutt will now listen to your pleas.

JABBA: Jedi!

HAN: Threepio! You tell that slimy piece of worm-ridden filth, he'll get no such pleasure from us!

There's not a lot of it, not remotely to the degree seen in your clip, and RotJ goes very hard on having Luke be courteous even to his foes. But there is a little.

She sassed him but then he blew her homeworld up. I don't think she won that exchange.

So clearly it's possible to tell a dramatic story in this genre, where the heroes win a desperate victory against overwhelming odds, without incompetent commanders.

Case in point, LotR. The good guys are fairly competent, just up against a juggernaut of an empire ruled by Satan's lieutenant himself.

This is even better in the books. Denethor and Theoden each have their moments of great competence, countered by the Witch-King. Saruman is arguably incompetent, but still a fearsome adversary just due to numbers and the timing constraints the free peoples are operating under.

That is not the case in the ST. The sequels have devoted significant screen time to establishing that their villains are a clown show. Kylo Ren is an immature brat who establishes screen presence through mere physical violence - he's a thug, with none of Vader's presence. Hux is a resentful boob, seen quivering with impotent rage more than he is genuinely threatening people.

That was a choice made mostly in TLJ, they didn't have to set them up this way.

This scene is in TFA. As is this one.

Ren was a figure of mockery from the first film.

That's not mockery on the "can't take this guy seriously level". Compare it to officer what's-his-name getting thrown around the room by Snoke, in front of his subordinates.

How could Snoke possibly become a threatening bad guy in the absence of, lol, having Palpatine somehow return earlier? Having a half-bit Palpatine was a huge mistake; the First Order should have been some combination of a) overwhelming military resources and b) stupid Dark Witches bullshit trying to regain the Force as an advantage. Snoke is a horribly bad villain from the bottom up.

Another big problem with TLJ is that most of the non-Jedi stuff (Rose, etc) is just incredibly cringe.

I do agree that this is somewhat interesting as meta commentary in TLJ: everyone is stuck trying to rehash the original trilogy, characters and fans alike. But the movie doesn't do enough with it, and, worst of all, RoS fatally ignores the critique made by TLJ instead of transcending it, which dooms both movies' critical value.

Its a funny take with some support in reality, but not on the military front. The real weird part about TLJ and the sequels is, the part where the Rebels allegedly won, but in universe the Empire guys are actually stronger now. A good story is the explanation why the rebels failed to establish a new, successful, government because very few people are George Washington and competent at governance during both rebellion and while founding a new nation. Most such scenarios do fail. Washington was an extraordinary figure.

The sequels being about bad governance and failure of new leadership is probably a much better set of movies, but also really hard to write.

I admit, I'm headcanoning that part pretty hard. But it really does help me enjoy the film if I imagine that Holdo really is just some incompetent buffoon who got the job by political shenanigans, and now everyone is just stuck dealing with her. Sort of like character Umbridge in Harry Potter 5 I guess.

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