#i just want the point that palpatine was always behind everything to be reiterated

[weregonnabecoolbeans]

If there is a star wars what if?, then i want each episode that takes place before anakin becomes vader to end with palpatine winning anyways

[obiwanobi]

(listen, sometimes Senator Kenobi only has to walk in a room and raise an eyebrow at Anakin for him to get all hot and bothered, so you know it’s not even a question of how sexy Obi-wan is but just an inherent reaction to Obi-wan’s presence now)

If I could write, you can be sure that this Senator Kenobi AU would be a 50k+ fic split between a long and dramatic slow burn filled with grand declarations of love (from Anakin) and a political satire where I would get a kick out of writing about incompetent politicians, bad decisions and egocentric maniacs on all sides, Padmé telling people to get their shit together and not ruin the Republic for everyone, Bail slowly taking charge of Palpatine’s opposition party one sarcastic comment at a time, and an acerbic Obi-wan too busy trying to rally people to his cause and keep a low profile after the media spread false rumours about his connection to the Jedi Order to remember to say ‘no’ to Anakin once in a while.

But I can’t, so let me tell you a bit more about how Anakin and Obi-wan got married! (It was a bit long, so you’ve got 1k of this AU under the cut)

I do like to think that they did get ‘secretly’ married. Not at the end of aotc, but years later at the end of the clone wars. I want a LOT of drama around it, because Palpatine is still around in this AU and Obi-wan is in the Delegation of 2000 with Bail, Padmé and Mon, to make sure that Palpatine returns his emergency power to the Senate and to repeal the Sector Governance Decree, which would make most senators, like Obi-wan, from far away or small or poor planets, useless.

During a meeting, Obi-wan makes the mistake of talking about involving the Jedi Council, and he can feel in the Force the moment he mentions it that the delegation gets a bit more restless, probably remembering his own connection to the Jedi Order. The Delegation doesn’t fully trust the Jedi, and by extension isn’t totally comfortable with Obi-wan, who is known to be one of their strongest supporters.

However, like a lot of members of the delegation, Obi-wan is convinced that something is not right with the Chancellor, and the feeling is getting stronger every time he hears Palpatine’s words in Anakin’s mouth. It always leads to them arguing, even if Anakin in this AU is more inclined to do some critical thinking once in a while when he remembers all the philosophy and politics lessons Obi-wan gave him. But Palpatine’s influence on him is still strong, and even Master Jinn comes to Obi-wan with a worried look (to Obi-wan. With a worried look. Master Jinn.) to ask about Anakin’s state of mind. They don’t see eye to eye on many subjects, Master Jinn has more than one time reiterated his opinion on Obi-wan’s presence in Anakin’s life, but this time is different. Master Jinn seems more than a few klicks away from his usual composed expression, and when he goes as far as mentioning private Jedi business, like the last heated discussions between Anakin and the Council, Obi-wan feels more than unsettled.

Jinn didn’t ask him for any help per se, but an impromptu visit from the Jedi Master that doesn’t end with them disagreeing on pretty much everything is enough to raise all the alarms in his mind. His concerns should be about the state of the alliance between republican forces and the Order, the trust of the public and the unrestrained power the Chancellor seems to get from it, but one thing pushes most of his worries to the back of his mind. Obi-wan has always been ready to make concessions. Anakin is just not one of them. He knows that he has to keep Anakin away from the political scene or getting irritated enough at the Council to make rash decisions for some time. And he knows exactly how.

At this point, Obi-wan has always declined Anakin’s MANY marriage proposals, but each time he says no, it’s just a little less firm and a little more reluctant. Anakin has that light in his eyes when he asks, the glimmer of solid hope that simply doesn’t want to leave Obi-wan’s mind when he’s hiding behind excuses after excuses to not look at Anakin’s resigned smile. It almost feels… wrong now, to push a ‘no’ out of his mouth, burning his tongue and crashing against his teeth.    

The last time he proposed, Anakin got down on one knee in the middle of the Senate Plaza, smiling like he knew exactly what he was doing, and refused to get up again before getting an answer, despite Obi-wan’s indignant pleas to please stop making a scene! He laughed like a delighted idiot when Obi-wan almost had to carry him to a more secluded street, amusing passers-by and fueling the gossip media for some time, surely. Obi-wan really wanted to throttle the idiot, but the untainted joy on his face was so rare since Ahsoka left the Order that Obi-wan let him get away with it with a bruising kiss and the promise of the opposite of a punishment. Distracted, Anakin didn’t realise that Obi-wan didn’t give any answer.  

A few days later, a rare occasion where Anakin doesn’t have to be anywhere and elects to spend his free afternoon bothering Obi-wan, he asks again. It’s the most childish thing Obi-wan has ever seen a grown man do: Anakin is spread out on the couch, poking at Obi-wan’s shoulder who’s not paying enough attention to him and repeating in a bored tone “Mary me. Mary me. Mary me.”

And really, Obi-wan is tired. So tired that he can barely focus on the words he’s reading (does he need glasses? He hopes not, Anakin would never let him live it down). Tired of having to explain that replacing senators by sector governors isn’t the right thing to do, tired of hearing that Padmé and Bail doing their best is just not enough when faced with bigotry and egotism, tired of critics about how turning Jedi into Generals was a mistake from people who put them in this position in the first place. Tired of worrying that one day Anakin isn’t going to spend his free time with a soon-to-be useless politician who doesn’t even have the time to properly say hello to the only person he’s still happy to see entering his office.

Obi-wan suddenly grips Anakin’s fingers pressed to his shoulder.

What difference will it make? They’re already more married than most couples anyway. Hell, he calls Anakin more than Bail calls Breha when he’s deployed.

He catches the surprise in Anakin’s eyes.

He’s going to do something stupid. Anakin level of stupid. It’s selfish and unbecoming of a Jedi and a Senator. If it doesn’t stay secret (and Obi-wan knows that it’s probably just a question of time) it’s going to be an utter mess, a political disaster, a complete disregard of the Jedi code.  

Anakin reaches in the Force for him and Obi-wan remembers that he has never wanted to say no to him.

“No great ceremony. No long and painfully detailed monologue about my eyes, my hair or my butt, and please, no over-the-top romantic decorations or I’ll make you marry me on a sandy beach.”

It takes at least fifteen seconds for the words to reach Anakin’s brain. When it does, he tries to sit up too fast, falls from the couch, bumps his head against the table, grips Obi-wan’s leg to push himself up, shove the datapad in his hands away and stares at Obi-wan while stuttering incoherent monosyllables. He looks so lost and charming and perfect that Obi-wan is certain that he will never regret the most ill-advised decision he has ever made in his life.

[dgcatanisiri]

So. Did see Rise of Skywalker today.

“Flawed, but probably as good as we were going to get” is my two cent summary, especially given some of the whispers I’m hearing about what went on behind the scenes that, in effect, this was “the Disney shareholder’s” trilogy more than any individual, and I think you all can guess my opinion of the Disney shareholders in general... (plus the inevitable difficulty of trying to unify two movies that honestly had a lot of tonal and thematic clash to begin with).

You want more details, they’re behind the cut, because I’m going to respect the spoiler tags.

First things first, let me get this out of the way first, Kelly Marie Tran and Rose Tico DESERVED. BETTER. Like, bare minimum, I think there should have been a scene between her and Rey at the start while Rey is reading the Jedi tomes. Just a little something that connects the two. Better still, use her as a touchstone character for what’s happening at the Resistance base in the first half - yeah, sure, you can only do so much with the jiggered footage of Carrie Fisher, but SO. WHAT. Leia doesn’t have to be in those scenes. 

Hell, have her and Connix talk, considering that Connix was significant enough to both be in charge of the D’Qar evacuation AND Poe’s right hand during the mutiny. Since Connix is played by Billie Lourd, Carrie Fisher’s daughter, it’d have been a fine connection there, especially if you want to include some foreshadowing of Leia’s eventual death, talk about them being concerned about the way that the General is handling everything happening, losing everyone so close to her.

Like, that’s the off the top of my head ways to enhance Rose’s part in this movie without significantly altering any of the plot. Truthfully, I think she should have been part of the group the whole time anyway. 

I still don’t particularly like the return of Palpatine as the big bad, meaning that we’re pretty much completely undermining the end of the original trilogy. I mean, wasn’t that what Anakin Skywalker’s death in Return of the Jedi meant? At least when the Legends line brought him back, it was a) still during the post-RotJ war clean up, where the Empire was still fighting after Endor, still part of the same war, and b) left ambiguous enough if that was genuinely Palpatine or just a clone that claimed to be the original Palpatine.

But I can also appreciate the thematic relevance of Palpatine, the Emperor, Darth Sidious, whatever name he uses, being the overarching villain of the Skywalker Saga. So... We’ll call it even? Meh.

I will RELUCTANTLY allow the idea of Leia sacrificing herself to pull back her son from the dark side, mostly on the basis of being limited by the footage of Carrie Fisher, so using her death to have story meaning can be tolerated. Still don’t like it - I have firmly been of the believe that, given all the times he made the active choice to be evil, he could not simply return to the light, be redeemed or forgiven. But since he did, ultimately, die, I will allow it - I’m only going to be able to view his death as, effectively, him making the only effort at atonement that could be done, stopping Palpatine, before his true penance came in not being able to be a part of the galaxy he helped to save.

That said, I do NOT accept the kiss. I will only even possibly pretend it happened under the pretense of being a heat of the moment victory thing that meant nothing. Because FUCK REYLOW.

First half of the movie is HORRENDOUSLY compacted. Like, I legit feel like there was a good fifteen minutes or more hacked out of it. Too much is happening right off the bat and just doesn’t stop. It settles down eventually, but MAN could that have done with less compression.

Honestly, overall, it feels like at least two movies crammed into one, like Disney refused to split it up because “but it’s a TRILOGY!” Which, uh... Not to open the “TLJ discourse” can of worms, but... That was always going to happen, considering the massive tonal clash between Abrams and Johnson as writers and directors. Especially with Johnson having basically done nothing that would advance a core arc, by way of having the main characters of the trilogy interact - TLJ had Rey, Finn, and Poe all in different plots in separate areas, which made no sense to begin with, considering these were supposed to be the core characters, shouldn’t they have actually gotten to interact sooner? 

Like I said in the summary, TFA and TLJ have little that actually connects them. In the sense of creating a coherent narrative, it’s not unreasonable that Abrams downplayed a lot of Johnson’s elements, considering that Johnson did the same with elements Abrams included in TFA - Finn’s potential Force affinity (I’ll get to that), the Knights of Ren (suddenly back with no explanation), the conscription of child soldiers as stormtroopers (which really SHOULD have been a core part of TLJ, instead of the child slavery on Canto Bight, considering it mattered to Finn’s character as already established), the idea that Luke had been searching for something (because why would he have left a map to where he was going in TFA if, as TLJ said, he went to Ach-to to wait for death?)... TRoS was always going to be in a bind on these things, and, really, considering that neither film prior was written with an ending in mind, there was no real solution but to just dance around the subject.

Let’s talk briefly about the Poe background stuff, which... *sigh* It was so POINTLESS to introduce the idea that he was a drug dealer. Like, first of all, RACIST AS FUCK to make the Latino man a drug dealer. Secondly, when and how, considering his canon back story is that he is the son of minor Rebel heroes, how did he have the time for this to happen? Third and not least, the guy’s an ace pilot, why WOULDN’T he know about hotwiring vehicles? He should know them inside and out!

Zorii is... There. That’s about all I really can say about her. Same with Jannah. Both of these felt like characters who SHOULD have had more relevance, had they been introduced sooner (and in which case, I’d toss Zorii and swap in Rose anyway). Considering they’re dropped in at the last second as they are, they honestly end up just feeling like props meant to portray Poe and Finn as straight, which... 

Okay, Disney overlords are homophobic cowards. Let’s just acknowledge that right off. Finn/Poe was a ship that was never going to be allowed off the ground. We all knew it going in. So make Finn/Rey a thing and let Poe be read as gay, even if it’s not said. It would have been that simple. TFA laid the foundation, and that hug in TLJ was a good building block as well. But no. You have to be cowards and not “rock the boat” by both not having an interracial relationship AND trying to appease the Reylows. Ugh.

Anyway, any and all flirtation between Poe and Zorii is PURE mlm/wlw joking with one another. Stormpilot is endgame. Rey/Rose is real. Fuck Disney and fuck canon. MOVING ON.

Also on that note, FINN IS FORCE SENSITIVE, GODDAMMIT. The adamant refusal to acknowledge this REALLY pisses me off, because Finn is a PERFECT mirror to Kylo Ren and should have been his counterpart throughout this trilogy - Finn was a nameless stormtrooper with no past, Kylo was the heir to legacies, Finn refused to slaughter innocents, Kylo gave that order. Finn embraced the Resistance, Kylo led the First Order. THIS is the duality of characters that should have driven this trilogy. I’m not trying to take away Rey’s significance, but...

When people complain about Rey’s lineage, I’m just not all that big on this matter. First of all, I was neutral on the subject from day one. As time has gone on, however, I have reached a point where I’m just ‘...well, yeah, of course she’s got an important lineage.’ Because TFA made a big deal of this fact. This was her driving motivation. On top of that, TLJ trying the “they were nobodies” thing actually legit pisses me off, because what abandoned child just casually accepts “they were nobodies”? Even if they weren’t significant (which, again, by way of Maz and the lightsaber calling to her in TFA, there was a strong implication of them being significant, particularly with the stage directions in the script for Luke and Leia when interacting with Rey), they weren’t nobodies FOR HER. But TLJ basically has her discard the search casually.

So you want a hero who comes from nothing? Again, may I present FINN, the stormtrooper who came from nothing, who should have been leading a stormtrooper uprising, who should have gotten to be a Jedi, who DESERVED BETTER THAN THIS TRILOGY GAVE HIM...

Gah. Okay. I’m tired of ranting about the things that I didn’t like. There ARE positives, I swear!

Chewie’s breakdown over Leia’s death about broke me. Like, the moment he collapses... God, that was choking me up an hour later, too. How much it must hurt Chewie and Lando to be the only ones left... Honestly, I was half afraid that the Falcon would be destroyed during that final conflict. 

Honestly, I know the idea was that Han’s appearance was just a figment, a manifestation of the inner thoughts, but I’m going to call it confirmation of Han being Force sensitive. Mostly because I picture Han losing his shit at the idea. And, honestly, I can’t help but wish that, at the least, we could have had Leia appear there, but we weren’t going to get that either way.

Speaking of Leia, honestly, I think they did the best they could with what they had of her, and, truthfully, I think it was a fine tribute to Carrie, to have Leia there, die within the context of this movie, and not just die off between films. Yes, it bound their hands some, but... It wouldn’t have been right without her, either. 

Though I do reiterate that the binding with the footage is no excuse for hacking Rose practically out of the film entirely.

I focused on the issues I had against the movie, mostly because I feel like they stood out more than the things that I liked. The problem this trilogy has had since day one is that they went into this without a plan. This trilogy never knew where it was going until this movie came along. So two movies of basically throwing everything at the wall, leading to one movie having to tie it all up. This movie was always going to struggle, but in the end, I think it probably came out as best as it could.

If you want to call that damning with faint praise... I suppose it sort of is, but, more truthfully, it’s seeing it for what it is and judging it as such. This movie was hobbled before it could walk, that it managed what it did as well as it did is really a tribute to those who tried to make it work.

I feel like that’s all the major things I have to bring up right now. Though I will add... Yeah, let’s be real. They call this the end of the Skywalker Saga, but in twenty years or so, we’re going to get a fourth trilogy. Because we’re basically at the point of “every generation’s going to have their own Star Wars trilogy.”