He was named. Names give identity. Names are a shackle on characters, a lack of a name( hence a title is a good workaround) gives a freedom of backstory.
Well of course they were. They actually had the competence to watch the movie they were in to find the heroes. Too bad they didn't watch all the way to the end.
Deliberately design a character to be mysterious and inspire speculation. Tie him to almost every unanswered question when it comes to "how did we get from Return of the Jedi to here?" Kill off said character like a chump mid-trilogy, answer nothing, make it painfully clear there is no overarching story plan, "your Snoke theory sucks." *Genius* Clearly anyone who doesn't like it just hates women.
Honestly, they've lost a lifetime fan because of that. They can't handle real criticism and instead decide to fling shit at their fans with false, virtue-signalling accusations of racism, sexism, being white males with no lives (because bullies never said that to me growing up). This is indicative that they're the real bullies. And I for one will never pay another cent to a bully; I know what it's like to have my lunch money taken, and this territory is all-too familiar.
@@QrazyQuarian I feel the exact same way. They lost me too. And it is sad, I felt very insulted as a fan. I won't watch 'Rise of the Skywalker' until it is a free movie on a flight or something like that
In the original trilogy, the evil Empire was the status quo that needed to be broken. There were enough references to the "glorious past" of the Republic for the audience to put the picture together: there was a good government back in the day, enforced by the heroic Jedi, then the evil manipulator Palpatine showed up and duped everybody. Nobody sits down and spells it all out to the viewers because that would be boring, but there is enough information about it that you can figure it out. The prequels basically just added detail to what was already mapped out. And the original trilogy's conclusion basically points at the return to the former, good status quo of the Republic. The fundamental problem with Disney's movies, IMO, is that they just invalidate the victory of Return of the Jedi by pulling Empire 2.0 out of nowhere, just because the writers have no imagination to come up with a new threat.
To elaborate on that, Snoke needs a backstory because at the end of ROTJ we, the audience, were shown that the galaxy's history was going in a completely different direction: totalitarian regime defeated, Republic restored. And instead of seeing the ramifications of that, or perhaps a vicious fight for supremacy between several factions trying to fill the power vacuum, we are given a new totalitarian regime firmly in place and the Rebels now calling themselves the Resistance and even more the underdog than before. It is almost as if we missed an entire movie, or trilogy, that would show how that happened.
Salty Socks Mainly what Obi-Wan says to Luke in his hovel before they find Owen and Beru, plus a lot of what is said between Imperial officials on the Death Star.
That's what I didn't like about the new movies, and even the original book series to an extent. There is a serious question about whether the galaxy would have been better off without the rebellion. If Palpatine was still in charge, with Tarkin managing the government and Thrawn the military. Everything might have turned out better in the books, and it almost certainly would have been better in the movie series.
Palpatine was most pathetic thing in original triology aside from ewoks and lets arrest people who have no qualm killing us supposedly evil stormtroopers.
@@milicevicx9686 Eh, you must be talking about Fantastic Four or some other garbage trilogy because you sure as hell can't be talking about Emperor Palpatine :)
To paraphrase Razorfist, there was no way in hell Snoke would ever be able to match or be on par with McDiarmid's performance as Emperor Palpatine. McDiarmid nailed that role backed by more than 40 years of stage experience. No matter how much speculation was dumped into Snoke and his past, all he did was a shallow, pale imitation of what Palpatine could mastermind in his sleep.
Lucky Fox Andy Serkis is a pretty experienced actor as well, and for motion capture no less. Not sure if the argument over the amount of experience holds up here, but the role probably wasn’t in his ball park
That’s probably why Ruin Johnson gave up on his character. “Awe, how am I gonna make Snoke cooler than Palpatine? I’ll just kill him off so I don’t have to worry about it!”
I've heard of Razorfist, but I've only recently started watching his channel once I learned that he is a big fan of pulp fiction. (Not the movie) I have to say his commentary on culture is always interesting.
There's also something more that Palpetine had that Snoke didn't...Build-up... The Emperor was mentioned in A New Hope - the guy in charge of the Empire just swept away the senate; meaning there is no longer a branch of Government that he must peddle to in order to get what he wants. He now officially holds absolute power over the entire Galaxy. Now think about what we saw in the original Star Wars all the way up to the midpoint of Empire; from what we saw, Vader was the badguy - the main antagonist of the entire franchise at this point. He was big, scary, had a dark costume, an emotionless face, and he killed Obi-Wan after torturing Princess Leia. He's the kind of guy that can crush a man's windpipe with ONE hand. Vader is a scary and intimidating force... So that being said...when he's so desperate to catch the Millennium Falcon to the point of losing ships in an Asteroid Field, WHAT does he do when he learns the Emperor is calling him? He immediately moves the ship out of the field to send a clear transmission, and when he takes that call...for the first time ever - we see VADER - the big bad of these movies - fall to one knee...Vader fears and respects THIS guy, because THIS guy is SO far above him; and he shows that dedication and respect by being punctual and not making mistakes or slip-ups. And when we see Palpetine for the first time, he's projected as a large, intimidating blue hologram, shrouded in darkness - making Vader look so tiny by comparison. THIS is the guy who is REALLY in-charge of everything. And even though it greatly conflicts with how he is in Return, the portrayal of him is meant to further evoke a mysterious vibe from him, and an almost inhuman like quality to his eyes. This guy was intimidating if he had someone like VADER so terrified of him. And what's even worse is, by the end of the movie Vader reveals his plans to overthrow the Emperor - meaning that he is incapable of moving against him ALONE without Luke's help, because of HOW much he fears the man. And we as the audience should too, if the opening of Return is any indication with Vader talking with the Commander on Death Star II - the mere acknowledgement that the Emperor himself is coming to the Death Star legitimately terrifies the guy, to the point where - despite he knows his resources are exhausted - he will somehow double the efforts of his workers... And Vader's threat against the man, describing the Emperor's attitude and methods as being LESS forgiving than his own, are a clear indication of what the man is capable of... Even YODA was afraid of this guy and warned Luke not to underestimate him... Then of course, every scene he's in shows that Vader is intimidated by him and we can see how visibly uncomfortable Luke is by being in the man's presence. He taunts Luke and goads him like some sadistic bond-villain, until finally a fight between father and son breaks out...all the while, the man is cackling maniacally - entertained by the proceedings. All of this builds up to a reveal of his terrible power - the Force Lightning; something that we didn't even know was possible. All I'm saying is...Palpetine had build-up that led to a satisfying pay-off... Now let's look at Snoke... I gotta be honest...he's mentioned like...ONCE in the Credit Scrawl of Force Awakens...and then, by the time he's mentioned again half-way through, he's suddenly revealed in the next scene...It's kind of jarring like - "Whoa, who the fuck is this guy? His name is Snoke? What the hell kind of a name is Snoke? This is Star Wars! Pick a better name!" And truth be told, Snoke is one of the most eye-rolling things about the movie, because it seemed SO desperate to once-again retread the same territory for Star Wars; this guy was just another Palpetine down to a T...but I kept thinking that MAYBE something interesting or unique would be revealed about him... And something was...His Fashion Sense is terrible...Instead of being a cold, intimidating presence in The Last Jedi...he instead wants to be "SHINY!" - just have him be voiced by Jemaine Clement and we're as good as done. That's the thing about Snoke...there was no build-up to him. He's just THERE...so matter-of-factly; just like the First Order, they were just "there"...I don't think Disney Lucasfilm understood the fact that there were NO movies coming in between this trilogy and the old one. And regardless of what they might think, Lucas structured the first trilogy intentionally with holes to be filled in later by the prequels. But just having what is effectively a facsimile of The Empire, the Emperor, and a brand-spanking new Death Star...it genuinely comes off like nothing has changed; like the efforts of the Rebels from the Original Trilogy were all pointless, because the Empire wasn't ever defeated. And of course, with a movie about a lonely orphan Kid on a Desert Planet, who finds a valuable droid with valuable information, having to escape the Planet on the Millennium Falcon, meeting with Han Solo and Chewbacca, and of course forming a parent-child relationship with an older mentor-figure, only to have that Mentor-Figure killed by a masked man cloaked in black - who has a long personal relationship with him - all on a Massive Planet-Destroying Super-weapon... Yeah...I just stopped caring at a point. The moment I saw Star Killer Base, I immediately gave up on the movie.
I also remember the reactions of the rebels when Mon Mothma revealed that the Emperor would be on the new Death Star. That really left an impression on me that I´ll always have in mind when it comes to good old Palpatine.
To add to this: Snoke showed up in an existing franchise. If this was a genuine reboot simply retelling the story of Luke Skywalker as an alternate universe (aka the JJ Abrams Star Trek reboot) or even a completely different series, Snoke might have been more acceptable as simply the mystery box. Call it "Galactic Battles" or something other than Star Wars, since it isn't. Spoof a similar look to the Star Wars universe like Space Balls, but as something completely different in its own universe it might be fine. It would still have problems and your observations here might be accurate. Unfortunately for Disney, they are stepping into an existing universe. The *reason* why fans are interested is because they see the Millennium Falcon, Han Solo, "General" Leia, and even Luke running around. They want to know "what happened after Return of the Jedi?" They want to iknow *that story* and it is why they are paying the bucks to watch the movie. Unfortunately, that question is only partially answered and Snoke comes out of nowhere to make an appearance. That is why his backstory is so vital, since it makes no sense that it could even exist after the Republic was restored. Luke represented.... *a return of the Jedi*. That is what the final movie in the trilogy promised and that the Jedi would once again take their role in safeguarding the Galaxy. Apparently Luke even started a new Jedi academy and was training padawan... and what became of them exactly? I won't go into the rest of the major flaws for the two post-ROTJ films as they are numerous and frankly missed opportunities in storytelling too, but this should have simply been made as a separate film outside of the Star Wars universe to get any sort of valid credit with Snoke as presented as a "mystery box". They didn't have the luxury but want to have their cake and eat it too. If you want to call this a sequel, then make it continue the story... which this did not.
@Xenovista Wrong. While it did start that way, George gradually evolved with the events and eventually wanted to tell the story that led into the OT. To remake the Star wars story from the simple Evil Empire vs plucky Rebel shtick, into the tragic space opera about the fall from grace and redemption of a hero. And he always had something more he wanted to add or fix. Every creator does. That's why he did the special additions. Moreover, while the movies made a lot of money, that was nothing compared to the toys, games and books. All of which told stories of a universe not his own. He always considered the EU as a separate universe, similar to the Marvel or DC multiverse.
Disney: Do you have any bad guys for sale? Lucasfilm: Ah yes we have the emperor. A powerful and cunning sith lord. Manipulated the senate and the seperatist to gain absolute power over all galactic systems. Built a super weapon and an army in secrecy, used the jedis own against them and wiped out all oposition. Disney: ...Do you have anything cheaper? Lucasfilm: We have snoke. Hes some guy... Disney: SOLD!
muskatDR Disney: *comes back* Hey so I broke that Snoke super quickly, it was incredibly underwhelming. Can I buy the Emperor now? I need a villain that’s scary and we have too many shirtless scenes with Kylo Ren for him to be the main villain. Lucasfilm: Ah, Okay. Was there at least some sort of lead u- Disney: No. Lucafilms: No lead up? This is one of the greatest cin- Disney: Don’t care, the Rise of Skywalker needs to make money and I don’t care what we ruin to ensure that happens.
Ok. Snoke could be fixed in my eyes with one line of dialogue. "When the empire fell. I felt like I was the last fragment of it. Now with what I have learned in secret. I have rebuilt the empire." That is a win win. His backstory is still mysterious in how was he connected to the empire, was he a stormtrooper with force sensitivity? Was he related to the emperor? Was he a royal gaurd taught in the darkside? Was he an assassin or inquisitor? We don't know but it explains 1) how he became a master of the darkside, 2) he is a leader and knows about the empire, and 3) it can give us a reason on how he built the first order up. It was a simple as that. You still make him mysterious and gives context oh how he got the power he has.
The First Order needed a lot more explanation than it got. If you hear "Empire", you know what it is and if you hear "Rebellion" you can deduce what it is if you put in on relation to Empire. What is a "First Order"? The name implies a religious group. Is Snoke worshiped like a god? What is the "Resistance" resisting if it works with the Republik? We needed a lot more explanation to understand what is going on.
The First Order being a bunch of Darkside fanboys doesn't really seem that far off in canon. Remember, everyone there thinks that the Empire is an alright thing...and take that sentiment up to 11.
@@ZKP314 The Empire wasn't darkside fanboys. Remember that officer on the Death Star who made fun of Vader for believing in the Force (I find your lack of face disturbing)? Most Imperials did not care the Emperor was a wizard or did not even believe it.
@@schwarzerritter5724 I said the First Order were darkside fanboys, not the Empire. Then again, at this point, there isn't much of a difference anymore.
Having the First Order be a religious (or possibly a cult) faction would probably be better and make Snoke different than Palpatine by not being just another dark side force user. That and maybe also remove the connection between the Resistance and the New Republic. It would probably be better, because then the Resistance is a group that are fighting against what seems to them at least to be a really powerful army, and all of this could happen with the Republic being in the dark on what's happening and they could then have the sequel trilogy build up to the Starkiller base finishing it's contruction so that the First Order could use it to deal a massive blow to the Republic before their attack on the galaxy.
Palpatine needed no backstory because he was originally called The Emperor. Palpatine was hidden by a title. Snoke on the other hand was named. A name gives specifics.
I think the answer to Sidious's backstory can be even simpler: everything we need to know about him is made plain via the foundation provided in the original trilogy. There is an Empire, and it has been established that he runs it. Vader is a Sith, a long line of force users who wield the Dark Side. Sidious is his master, the dark equivalent to Yoda, and a more powerful Sith Lord. What more do we need to know about him? Nothing! Everything is plainly relevant from the moment he steps off his imperial shuttle. Snoke, on the other hand, has no such foundation. There are many unanswered questions, many things we need to know. The Sith are dead, so why does he know the Dark Side? Why is he so much more powerful than Sidious or anyone else? What is his monstrous species, and where did he come from? Why do the First Order follow him instead of some human politician? And why on earth didn't we ever see him before? Where was he during the war between the rebellion and the empire? The difference is foundation. Palpatine had all he needed, while Snoke was nothing but a giant unanswered question...just like the sequel trilogy.
Oh and by the way: why was such a powerful Sith lord, the titularly leading antagonist, so easy to kill. With him in place, there is no way Kylo-Ren could have been the antagonist. The story-telling was crude, amateurish, patchy and needlesly convulted; in the process caricaturing Luke Skywalker, the seminal protagonist of the whole series.
Do you really think snoke can match Unlimited pOwEr in any way? 😅😃 I mean there were many occasions when a powerful sith (Not more powerful than Sidious) such as maul and some ancient sith too were able to live even after being slashed in half by a lightsaber. Snoke just couldn't keep up.
Palpantine got a backstory, he was implied to have risen up through a war for control. A war which Luke's father fought in as explained by Obi-Wan. Why wasn't his backstory stated? Because Lucas knew how to write well, it's called show, don't tell.
And also because he was the empire itself he was the cause for the war. Snoke was individualized from the first order, he's the master of it, he somehow changed Kylo Ren, which means he has an origin which means it needs to be explained. The emperor in the orginal trilogy is the empire as I stated, he is the personification of tyrannical order, he is the plot
Thanks! I'm glad you're enjoying the videos. I might start dabbling into reviews where I'll talk about character archetypes, writing styles, and other tropes that might be of interest to the creative community.
Does JJ even know that his Snoke was doomed to a premature death by Johnson??? Was he being indifferent, did he even make object, was he too confident with his mystery box BS??
@@maverickdarkrath4780 exactly. There was a backstory and treatment for the trilogy filled with answers, but they were all chucked out by that Petulant Prick.
@@maverickdarkrath4780 I still don't understand why Disney couldn't stick with one director and instead went on a route of Ryan and JJ being too busy undoing each other's plot decisions to actually make good Star Wars movies.
In fairness, J.J. Abrams probably DID have at least some vague idea for a backstory for Snoke before Rian Johnson decided to take The Last Jedi in a more... contrarian direction. Not saying it would necessarily have been good, but it would certainly have been better than NOTHING. What you're saying here ties in very well with my biggest problem with TLJ. It doesn't tie up narrative threads, it burns them. The only explanation for any of the mysteries is, "it was all random and meaningless." It's like the movie was actively mocking people for getting invested in the new trilogy. "You were interested in this plot thread or that character? Screw you, it doesn't matter!" It's hilariously bizarre for anyone who didn't care about the story, and infuriating for the people who did.
Agreed. Instead of making Abrams the focal point for the outcome of the entire trilogy Kathleen Kennedy has given JJ a pass. Especially when Daisey Riddley came out and stated JJ had a treatment for not only 8 but 9 as well and that Rian choose not to keep any of the ideas. I don't see how the mess that is TLJ is on Abrams.
No, I'm not willing to give JJ Abrams a free pass on this. He's the one who gave us Mary Sue, Emo Boy, and Screw-My-Interesting-Backstory. He's the one who decided to make Luke a pathetic runaway with a whopping 30 seconds of screen time. He's the one who basically pushed the reset button and make the first movie all over again. He's the one who forgot to take the time to build up the world we were watching, making it feel small, confused, and pathetic, not grand and imposing. Sure, _The Force Awakens_ isn't *as* bad as _The Last Jedi_ , but JJ was the one who filled up the dumpster with bags of gasoline-soaked manure, all ready for a lit match. That said, the person who is _really_ to blame for all this is the Dark Empress who selected both directors and green-lit their decisions.
I'm not giving JJ Abrams a free pass at all. He did do all the things you said, and it was all because he wanted to remake A New Hope with muh representation without worrying about whether it actually made sense as a sequel. I'm just saying this particular instance with Snoke did not go how he'd planned it to go. I believe he's said as much in interviews. So you've got two directors, neither of whom were given any limits or guidelines, playing tug of war with the story. It's astounding that Disney higher ups were this totally careless about a franchise this massive.
@@davidh.4944 im not gonna say that he didn't copy ANH beat for beat but at least he had some interesting ideas and characters that could've been great if handled correctly but as previously stated Rian Johnson threw out all of JJ's plot threads and outlines for eps 8 and 9...who knows what his original plan for this trilogy was it could've been great if given more care is all I'm saying. It had potential🤔🤷♂️
For me, when I first found out who Palpatine was, I assumed since he's the Emperor, he started how the Empire ran things. There wasn't really a need for an explanation. The prequels later came and expanded upon the character. That's really all there was to the Emperor and that was all that was needed. The guy who started it all, and upon his death, it all ends. Snoke on the other hand, is this powerful being who came out of the blue and was later killed off pretty much as fast as he was introduced. On top of this, unlike Palpatine, Snoke was built up big time. He was also so powerful that Luke Skywalker was afraid of him. Luke (the man who decided to go toe-to-toe with Darth Vader, the most feared man in the many galaxies that the Star Wars cannon exists in) was afraid of this guy. Even then, Vader was nothing more than a puppet to the Emperor. The Emperor was able to keep Vader in line. Luke wasn't even afraid of the man who was a step up in the ladder of people to fear. You don't just introduce a character that the most optimistic character in the series is afraid of and don't explain who he is. Iguess you can do that if you want people to hate your movie. Oh wait, that's what Rian Johnson set out to do: create a movie people either love or hate.
It is always fun to speculate and use our imagination to come up with stories on our own, and wonder what things would be like if we had seen them on screen. The Clone Wars, first mentioned in A New Hope, did that. People started wondering what it was about and what adventures could have been told at the time. It was fun and exciting. The Clone Wars wasn't vital to the plot, but helped it move along, and gave us a small glimpse into something much larger as to who Luke's father truly was. When the character of Snoke was first announced, we were told he was a powerful being from another galaxy, who had been around and watched the rise of the Empire, and waited for his moment. It was not the fans that made this up. It was 100% fact given to us before The Force Awakens was released. We were told these things about Snoke, fanning the flames as to who he was, where he came from, and exactly how powerful he is. Rian Johnson has gone on record stating he had already plotted out The Last Jedi before The Force Awakens was released. He had not even seen the film, but decided to take the characters and what he knew before, and plotted what he wanted. He essentially created his own "What if?" fan film that was somehow approved. Even if it is revealed Snoke is not dead in Episode IX, and it's all been a farce of him pulling strings, it will feel false and a blatant turnaround, attempting to correct mistakes and errors in The Last Jedi. Say what you will about George Lucas, but he wrote and had the entire original trilogy plotted out before even filming. He even had aspects as to what he wanted to do with the prequel trilogy. Sure he changed some stuff here and there, but in the end, he knew exactly where Luke, Han, Leia, Obi-Wan, Darth Vader, and Palpatine, were coming from, and their journey as to how it was all going to end.
I want to correct you on something: George Lucas did not have the entire original trilogy plotted out before filming. He had the first movie plotted out before filming. When the fans wanted more that is when he worked off of what he established in the first film to plot out the next 2 films. This is why if you only watch A New Hope the movie feels complete on its own as its own story, because it was designed as a stand alone film. This is also why Empire Strike Back does not feel like a complete film on its own, and why Phantom Menace did not feel complete on its own.
Imagine if Snoke had extreme natural skill in some kind of Dark Side version of the Jedi mind trick, to the point his own master was terrified of him. His master locked him away in some kind of life-support system and forgot about him. He was trapped for so long that he became permanently scarred, pale, and physically weak. But over time, and by using an ever growing connection to the Dark Side to manipulate events around him, he got free. Eventually, by setting up connections in the Empire during its rise and after its fall, he had amassed a force comparable to the late rebel alliance. After the empire was destroyed, Snoke brought together all of the survivors, as well as some new people who hadn't been involved in the first war at all, and re-attempted to establish their political power. Snoke had no issue corrupting anyone who disagreed with him, except those with a strong connection to the original alliance to betray it. His first order of business was to find a suitable apprentice. Due to his own experience with natural talent surpassing learning ability, he attempted to find someone who had a strong connection to the force and found that Kilo was a perfect match. The only issue with him was that Luke was already teaching him. After weeks of manipulating both Luke and Kilo to put a strain on their relationship, he caused Luke to attack Kilo, resulting in Kilo running away to Snoke's arms. Luke then runs off to his island, not because he hated the Jedi, but out of shame for what he had done and fear that he would do it again.
"The imperial senate will no longer be any concern to us. I have just received word that the emperor has dissolved the council permanently, the last remnants of the old republic have been swept away.. ..The regional governors now have direct control over their territories.." This line of dialogue give us more insight into the emperors character than all of episode 7 and 8 put together gave us of supreme leader snoke's. And more importantly it's a "mystery box" done right. It shows actual world or in this case galaxy building. how does the emperor maintain control? he has a chain of command being appointed governors. There used to be a republic but now there's an empire with him at the head how did that happen? doubled with darth vader's complete obedience the dialogue tells the audience the emperor is extremely powerful, ruthless, and should be feared. we get none of this with snoke. now imagine if when luke went to bespin in episode 5, the emperor was just there with vader for some reason and in the very first scene of us the audience seeing the emperor not through a hologram but physically there FOR THE FIRST TIME, vader kills him without having to fight either him or luke. that is exactly what happened to snoke with rey and kylo. i love star wars, but these sequels are so poorly written it really is a shame.
Basically, a character backstory or lack thereof can be summed up by how many questions arise from the character and how many are answered. Palpatine: How did he become emperor? He did evil shit and rose to dictatorship. What is his goal? Crushing the Rebellion to solidify his rule of the galaxy. Snoke: in a post empire, sith, and jedi world, what rock was he hiding under all this time... where does he come from? Hmm. How did he unite the first order? Hmm. How did the first order even form? Hmm. What does he *really* want to do? Hmm. An Emperor facing rebelliom is kind of self explanatory, even without a Moral duality explanation. It is a dictatorial political seat warding off an populist uprising. Everything he comes from, is and wants is pretty easily assumed and the prequel trilogy showcases those natural assumptions in detail. There aren't many questions that needed to be answered surrounding him for the audience to understand. Snoke, by design as a mystery box even, is nothing but intentionally unanswered questions that are to be fulfilled later(and never are)
This is a great summary of what reasonable people inherently understand. The amount of justification that fans of the Sequel Trilogy, and specifically 'The Last Jedi' engage in, is staggering.
5 років тому+5
Palpatine is not even a named character in the original trilogy. The name "Palpatine" was introduced in the prequels. In the original trilogy he is simply referred to as "the Emperor". There was no need to name him, because there is only one Emperor. When Tarkin says: "the Emperor has dissolved the Council permanently" nobody asks "which emperor?"
This would be like if we got prequels first and Palpatine wasn't in them at all, and then when we get to the original trilogy he's just there. With no explanation.
I'm glad you brought up Star Wars' pulp origins. So many people forget this, to the point where a lot of EU novels read more like sci-fi than the pulp space fantasy Star Wars is suppose to be. I also think it's a factor left out of the narrative of the sequel trilogy. The sequel trilogy -- particularly the first film, The Force Awakens -- was a nostalgia product, but it was a nostalgia product for a piece of media (the original Star Wars trilogy) that itself was a nostalgia product, tapping into the thirty year nostalgia cycle by updating the old pulp serials to a modern era. That makes The Force Awakens a copy of a copy, which to my mind goes a long way toward explaining its many failures. So you have a film in the 2000s trying to mimic the 80s by copying a film from the 80s that itself was updating a genre prevalent in the early to mid 20th century and ... well, let's just say some things got lost in translation. Then The Last Jedi comes along and purposely subverts all the classic tropes that are the very essence of Star Wars. The whole thing makes about as much since as turning the next Indiana Jones film or Conan comic into a romantic comedy.
The big mistake is that in this trilogy I don't even have the sense of danger for the heroes. I know that they have already won since Rey defeated Kylo in SW 7 without reason. They have never lost a single battle. Palpatine was a major threat in the original trilogy. He built a Death Star, destroyed planets, destroyed the Rebel base and forced them to find another (Hoth), only to root them out again and again (Endor). He kept finding them whatever they did. He controlled Vader, who inspired fear throughout the whole galaxy. And in the end, he amost killed the main hero by Force Lighting, a new power we had not seen in the previous movies. Snoke on the other hand, had so much potential to be a great villain. But, he was sacrificed for nothing. I don't care about his backstory. But I care that he was presented as a mysterious powerful villain and they threw him away like this. The Ewoks were more of a threat than him. And now, in the last movie we are left with Kylo Ren who has never won a lightsaber duel and looked like he had a hard time with Snoke's guards. He lost to an untrained Rey, but he killed almost 20-30 of Luke's fully trained students. Take notes from Marvel's Thanos. That's how you make a true villain. And everyone was pleased, because the role of the villain is to inspire fear for the safety of the hero. Otherwise, it's just boring. Sorry for writing so much guys.
Snoke also needed a backstory to separate himself from Palpatine because otherwise he comes off as just a rip off version of Palpatine's character, which is exactly what he was.
I think the biggest difference is the following: When Episode 4 came out there was no established world. Nobody asked "Why is there an Empire? Why is the Emperor in charge?". It was a new world where everything was possible. But the situation in Episode 7 is drastically different. You can't just create something new. It also has to fit with everything that's already there. And Snoke and the First Order just don't fit at all.
A New Hope did the right thing and provided context for the Emperor both as a figure and as antagonist without even needing to _show_ him. Just in the conference room scene with Tarkin and Vader, they explain the Emperor's methods, goals, and effectiveness in only a few lines of dialogue- 1. The Imperial Senate is no longer issue, it's been dissolved, so the last remnants of the Republic are gone. Democracy no longer exists, and the words "swept away" implies that this action did not require any real effort to execute. 2. The Empire does not require the bureaucracy offered by the senate any longer. It will instead rely on regional governors to control their sectors and enforce the will of the Emperor, aided by the fear generated by the existence of the Death Star. So the Empire's, and by extension the Emperor's, methods revolve around a simple concept- cow them into submission, or vaporize them entirely. In just _these lines alone,_ we can gather that there is an Emperor, and that he is a classical tyrant who uses fear and destruction to oppress people. It didn't need any sort of buildup or tremendous backstory to explain, because it wasn't relevant to the plot. In the same vein, Sauron is ultimately the main antagonist of Lord of the Rings; but while there _is_ an immense backstory that goes over his existence and rise to power, it's not relevant to the plot of the events the Third Age. The movie spends a little time explaining that he forged the Rings of Power, and then One Ring to control them; and that he was challenged and defeated by an alliance of Men and Elves. Then it goes on to say that as long as the One Ring persists, Sauron will be able to return to Middle-Earth. This constitutes only a fraction of a percent of Sauron's history, but it's all we need to understand both the story and the stakes. Snoke doesn't get to have this treatment, not when plot points concerning the rise of the First Order and Kylo Ren's tutelage are centered around him. The burden of nearly _any_ sequel is that you must be able to bridge the gaps between each movie consistently, if not effectively; and not handwave them with a half-assed explanation (or in Snoke's case, no explanation at all).
I love all of your videos. Not only do you bring up all the good points, but you do so in a precise and easy to understand way. It doesn't take you 40+ minutes to explain things. Love it! Keep it up.
I'm honestly just commenting for the algorithm. I've only recently discovered your content, and I'm loving every second. You deserve 1 million plus subs and I hope they find you.
I completely agree with you. Great video. Palpatine didn't need a lot of backstory considering the threat of the empire. Every time the empire did things effectively it showed palpitines strength. Due to background info that explaination works with palpatine not with snoke
Imagine, if you will, a hypothetical prequel trilogy where Palpatine didn't exist, was never made reference to, and was never even named. Instead, Chancellor Valorum takes the role of villain. It otherwise plays out roughly the same; RotS ends with Anakin burning to death on Mustafar, the Republic in ascendance with the Jedi expanding their power after the failure of Order 66, and the Chancellor has his powers limited. Now imagine the OT plays out exactly the same (Palpatine and all) and see how many logical inconsistencies you can spot. The Emperor didn't get a backstory in the OT because nothing about his existence or abilities contradicted previous film events (because there were no previous films to contradict). We knew everything we needed to know, and when we went back for the prequels, we got enough information to understand how he ended up the way he did. Snoke, otoh, shows up with immense dark power commanding a supposedly shattered imperial force on par with the old empire and takes the galaxy practically overnight.
Very well argued, I’ve really been enjoying your content. And for anyone who wonders what “Snoke done effectively” might look like, please let me point you to Timothy Zahns original take on Grand Admiral Thrawn.
Even in the early days, they DID have a backstory for Palpatine: he was the last leader of the Republic before it became the Empire. The Prequels only expanded upon that backstory, but it was already there in ancillary materials during the run of the Original Trilogy.
I did not at all mention that there was nothing before or aftet the OT to cause problems, Sequals are SEQUALS if it breaks things it's not the originals fault, aswell as prequals are technically sequals because they came later, problems they bring up is not the fault of the OT, its bad writing in the prequals
Some thing from I remember from the ending of Mass Effect 3, one of the creators quoted Agatha Christie about mysteries. Honestly I can't remember the exact quote, but it was to the effect that you should never revile all the details of and leave people wondering. This does NOT work for sci-fi, and sadly too many major productions these days are following this advice too much, and not as a way to bring intrigue, but as a way to be lazy.
That's a really strange concept to apply to scifi indeed. The whole point of scifi is that it's essentially a Socratic exercise and as such your what ifs need how do'es. The same can be said for any story that has boatloads of world building in fact. The world of Middle Earth for example would be a lot less interesting if there did not exist answers to a lot of its mysteries. Agatha Christies argument is something that can apply to short stories and horror flicks. But not something that is grand.
Imagine if they did a sequel trilogy to Lord of the Rings and the new movie opens by telling us (emphasis on TELLING us) that the victory of "The Return of the King" was undone by some new villains. Like, we're not shown how they did that, they just did, roll with it (even though the good guys keep kicking their asses in the same way the First Order does, they're terrible villains despite being meant to be better than the Empire, like "WE HAVE A STARKILLER BASE SOOO MUCH BIGGER AND STRONGER THAN THE DEATH STAR" ->gets destroyed by the end of the film... "WE HAVE A BIG BAD DREADNOUGHT" ->gets destroyed by the end of the scene... "WE HAVE A SUPER DUPER MEGA STAR DESTROYER" ->gets destroyed by the end of the film) and to top it all off, we learn nothing about this new villains who undid the victory of the original trilogy, they get killed in a quick and underwhelming way. ...This would NOT be okay with people.
Your explanation of plot relevancy makes me think of the Monogatari series by Nisioisin. When it was adapted into an anime by Shaft, they stuck to that idea by pretty much never having another person seen in the background who aren't the main characters or have relevance for the story. Even if it does, they have no real defining features, except enough for us to get an idea of who they might be at a glance.
They should have had the Grysks be the villains of the new trilogy. Or the Yuuzan Vong. Either would be a credible threat, with the Grysks' incredible mind-breaking powers, or the Yuuzan Vong's immunity to the Force.
The part at 8:50 is excellent advice for any writer that hopes to make their own story. I've failed more times than I care to count on a lot of stories. It came down to my inability to make a relevant, structured, well written plot with a hook. This changed with a recent story, and unfortunately, I've come down with a serious case of writer's block on how to advance the story. With the last scene I've written for the story, things seem wrapped up, which wasn't my intention. Now, it's a problem. I have to find a way to not undo what I've created, but add to the narrative that has been built and enhance that narrative while "delivering" on the story I want to craft for my readers. The next chapter is only a month old since the previous one, still writing it, however, at the same time, playing the devil's advocate, that month long hiatus can lose people if it appears I'm no longer interested, willing to deliver, or if I deliver a crap plot enhancement. There are so many tools at the writer's disposal. It's like gazing at the tool section of [insert favorite improvement store] and trying to decide if you need a hammer, hacksaw, circular saw, or just a simple screwdriver to tighten some loose ends.
When I saw The force awakens and The last jedi, I thought Snoke's ideology was different than all sith. I think it would have been interesting if he was revealed to be a Light side force user. Someone who strives for Domination and control through order and temperance just like the old republic jedi.
That is an amazing idea and would've resulted in an intriguing backstory and motivation for Snoke. Sadly, an idea that cool would require the writers to do something fresh and inventive rather than rehash old ideas, which isn't something the Star Wars franchise has excelled at. The track record for original ideas was pretty piss poor long before Disney came along.
Fun fact: Palpatine does have a backstory even if it isn't essential to his character in the movies. It just gives details on how he rose to power. He was a cruel rich kid on Naboo who discovered he was a prodigy in the force. He later killed his entire family because he saw them as being in the way and he would fall under the mentorship of Darth Plagueis who honed his power and assisted in devising the plan to take over. It's interesting but, as I said, doesn't effect his character as the ultimate bad guy.
The first few movies were still a new thing on the market, there was just the three movies, some comics, and that was it. Palpatine didn't need much of a backstory considering A: The universe we were presented with was a half dozen years old, the world wasn't as polished even for the time, nor did it need to be. And even then, Snoak came in after what, 40 years of story? The audience has had literal generations to devour star wars and between the requels, the games, and everything else the story was far more fleshed out and didn't have as much room for mystery. B: The way he was presented was enough to let us know who he was and what he was about. He got more than a handful of scenes to just be mysterious and then die. Whereeas Snoak just raised a bunch of questions like "who is he and where did he come from?" Palpatine let us know through story, where as the story of the new "trilogy" (if disney doesn't cut their losses with SW9) built up Snoak as a mystery, and then cut that mystery away as another one of the "subversion of expectations" which ultimately did the new stuff a disservice. Palpatine wasn't introduced until episode 5, where episode 4 had given us an introduction to the universe and the state it was in. From there in a story standpoint he was able to stand on his own two feet from there. Meanwhile Snoak was pushed in at the end of 7 where he was jammed into what was essnetially the first act of the new story where we're being once again introduced to the state of the world. Setting him up in a place that arguably made him a bigger deal than the emperor, just to cut him down with no fanfare, and show that Mar-rey sue and discount vader as "even more awesome than what came before them".
What I don't see alot of people mention is that Sheev didn't appear onscreen in Ep. IV, appeared briefly in Ep. V, and was finally introduced in Ep. VI. All the while, he was mentioned throughout the first two films as a prominent figure before actually showing up in the flesh for the third. He was somewhat of a mystery box himself at the start of the OT, but he was gradually BUILT UP for his big reveal in the LAST movie. Yes, we wondered what the details were as to how he became what he was, but those details didn't really matter, because the simple answer was: Corruption from Darkness. That can work for a villain in a relatively binary 3-part story. Introducing a villain in the 7th part of a complex 9-part story with no context and then killing him off in the 8th part DOES NOT work.
I found a novel of Return of the Jedi dated back to when the movie actually came out. It blew my mind that in the novel way back when, Lucas already decided that Palpatine was a chancelor who gained far more power then he should have had. This of course is a direct reference to Hitler, rising from a chancellor to Fuhrer. I asked my Dad and uncles about what they knew of Palpatine as kids, a couple of them mentioned that they knew Palpatine was in some manner a politician who gained more power similar to Hitler. They couldn't remember where they got this idea, they think it might have been from cards or the toys even. Or maybe it was even a more subconcious assumption. He is the Emperor of an Empire, a Senate was mentioned very early on as no longer having any power, and with all the WW2 German army designs incorporated into the Empire it is easy to come to the conclusion that the Emperor was not born an Emperor but seized power himself in some manner.
But Palpatine DID get even more characterization and backstory, before even appearing in person. Remember the scene of officer's meeting on the Death Star in New Hope? What is the first thing that Tarkin says after entering? That Emperor dissolved the Senate and Empire (dictatorship) has completely erased any remnants of the Republic (democracy). Regional governors have absolute power now and they are to rule through fear of the Death Star. This shows Palpatine as a ruthless ruler with virtually unlimited power and means to enforce it.
Palpatine is just like fire lord Ozai in ATLA. He didn't need to have a complex backstory, all we needed to know was that he was the evil ruler of the fire nation, and he filled that role perfectly. And due to the things said about him throughout the series, by the time Aang and Ozai fight, we are aware of just how dangerous and powerful he was.
Every time I hear your theme song at the end, it reminds me of an episode of Star Trek Enterprise episode Vox Sola.If you listen to the first tones of her trying to use the UT on the alien creature the pings sound like the ones in your music. memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/Vox_Sola_(episode)
9:01 Lost was a series built entirely on broken promises. That’s the reason why I’ll never trust JJ Abrams as a storyteller again. He fooled me once with Alias, and fooled me twice with Lost. He won’t fool me a third time.
I think a big reason is because the Star Wars universe originally existed in a contextless void. Once the newest movies came out, Star Wars has context galore and Snoke played a very important role and needed context.
This video essay brings a lot of valid points of what to do as a writer to be unique. And not copy your favorite films for me it .Star Wars he says "But it's even better to learn from someone else's mistakes" literature devil
Palpatine had one other important moment of exposition that added to his role of the "ultimate BBEG" right before passing away Yoda told Luke to "never underestimate the power of the emperor". That seven words alone give us everything you need to know about Palpatine´s position within the empire and his power, if even a wise and old Jedi Master like Yoda is cautious, maybe even afraid about him. Similarily to the problems with Rey, Snoke´s Backstory could be kept shrouded while still revealing plot-relevant details. There are several planets within the unknow regions that harbor old Sith temples. Similar to Darth Bane, Snoke could have learned from the knowledge stored there to become the powerful dark lord he is established to be and within the Force lies the answer to him leading the First Order: he just needed to subjugate or manipulate the imperial forces and then condition future generations to unflinching loyalty (they get trained and indoctrinated from childbirth so that is not unreasonable) and since he hold dominion over the military forces, he could also control the population by means of fear. The imperial forces spend several years or even decades in the unknown regions before reemerging as the First Order so there would be enough time to establish an economy or to restructure an existing one to supply his initial push and then draw from planets/groups that are still loyal towards the empire within the new republic. Most plot-relevant questions can be explained away by this while still keeping the most important question unsolved: Who is he, what is his relation to Palpatine and what does he plan to achieve? This way we still get the Mystery-Box but there are less possible plot-holes to fall into. It was still an idiotic move from Disney to kill off their BBEG mid-trilogy in such an anticlimatic way.
Good points. But I would also argue that it is not always the case that you OWE the people an answer. Sometimes, questions are better than answers. Sometimes answers aren't good enough. Allan Moore knew this when he wrote V for Vendetta. He knew that a reveal of V's identity would never be satisfying. He knew the question was stronger than the answer. David Lynch also knows that. He HATES answers. I would argue though, that you have to give the audience something. That can be multiple possibilities for an answer. theories based on little snippets given in your story. If the search for an answer ends in a discussion amongst fans and many fan-theories, that is its own beautiful thing and would only be spoiled by a straight answer. That being said. Snoke doesn't provide ANYTHING of the sorts. We were given NOTHING. And even if they try to give us more in episode IX, at this point, it's actually too late. You need to do this BEFORE you get rid of the character (even if the death of Snoke ends up being a fake-out). After the death, it just feels like a retcon and excuse.
I think another difference between Palpetine and Snoke is that, when you watch 'A new hope', you're new to the world of star wars. When we heard of Palpetine he was already part of the status quo. We just didn't know what the status quo was yet, so why would we ask questions about him. When Snoke came into the picture, we already knew the world of star wars and how we left it the last time. So when the sequels start with a completely new villain in an already known world, it's hard to accept that without knowing how he came into the picture. It would be like the prequels ending with Yoda defeating Palpetine. In 'A new hope' everybody would have a backstory, but it would be hard to accept Palpetine as the villain without explenation because that's just not how we left this universe the last time.
The mystery revolving around Snoke's identity was one of the best things of The Force Awakens. It was more fun to speculate who he might be and where he might have come from and what he might want then watching the movie. And The Last Jedi destroyed it all. They probably didn't find a good solution (which had not already been discovered) themselves, so they went with this "Your Snoke theory sucks" narrative, hoping they could pull off a new "I am your father" twist. But it didn't work at all. Really disappointing as The Last Jedi had the potential to really add to the Star Wars lore in a positive way. Instead it killed Star Wars and possibly forever... 😕
Neither Snoke nor Palpetine necessarily needed backstories, but they certainly help. Palpetine got away with it because his character was actually intimidating and powerful. Snoke was just a mysterious guy who did barely anything directly and died such an anti-climatic death. Palpetine was a threat, Snoke was a plot device.
A student of the Dwarti, darkside Force users who were powerful and influential politicians and scholars when the old republic was young. And the Emperor’s contingency plan laid out in aftermath explains that he did in fact appoint a successor in the unknown regions, which is why the imperial remnants went there in the first place.
Another thing people forget is that part of this was a refrence to Rome. Rome was once a republic and there were desires to turn it back into a republic. So there was some historic tropes Lucas was pulling from. Abrams....nothing. Just like what was in his mystery box.
Absolutely loved your explanation of this problem. You're one of the only people I have come across to convey the real problems of the franchise in a straight-to-the-point manner while adding those last few bits at the end that had to be said. Its true that I feel like I have the opinion of a "toxic fan" when I point out the inconsistencies of the current Star Wars saga, its kind of like that game "We Happy Few" where if you're not taking enough joy, the citizens of Wellington Wells begin to turn on you and hunt you down while yelling "Downer!" at you. If I'm not conforming to the modern ways that we are suppose to recognise in media, then I am nothing but a basement dwelling, Trump supporting man baby who should be ashamed for believing this. I really look forward to seeing more of your content as you can argue logically and point out that there is an agenda in media now.
This was a very well thought out and extremely truthful video essay keep up the good work im now subscribed after watching three videos and those three that ive watched all have the descripter at the beginning of this sentence. Thank you
In A New Hope we learned that There had been a past republic. We learned that the Emperor had finally dissolved the Senate of that old republic. From just that I can tell you plenty about the backstory of the emperor and even a lot about his behind the scenes actions during the events of the movies. For example: Though it has clearly been a long time since the Empire was formed, the enduring presence of the Senate shows that the emperor didn't destroy everything at once, he converted the territories he ruled over time, slowly but with a few significant pushes. He now has no fear the the public will feel upset at losing their Senate. He has already through decades of work secured his power so completely he no longer needs the slightest bit of propaganda to tell people otherwise. This interestingly enough coincides with the completion of the Death Star. With the show of complete political power after perhaps a lifetime of planning, he also holds complete military power. Note that I didn't reference any specific events or statements outside of those two from the very first movie. Two movies before we met the Emperor in the flesh and decades before the prequels which officially told the story of the Empire's rise, the groundwork had been laid. Everything we needed to know about the Emperor and his past could be speculated through nothing more than the most basic world building. The sequel trilogy lacks that world building. There is no useful knowledge to be gained from discussions of the First Order's operations. They apparently got their soldiers by kidnapping babies and raising them to adulthood. Meaning the storm troopers we see are the first and only generation of First Order stormtrooper, so I guess somewhere they have a secret daycare planet to raise and brainwash future soldiers. So the First Order has literally just come out of nowhere just in time for Ben Solo to turn to the dark side and become one of their leaders, under a super powerful force user who's plan was to brainwash a bunch of babies, raise them into loyal adults without drawing serious attention from the Republic's armies, all while building a gigantic superweapon(with child labor I guess?) again still without drawing any attention from the Republic despite his planet gun being close enough to the Republic capital planets that it could shoot them all in no time at all. How does that even work? The lasers didn't look like they were going that fast, but apparently it was too fast for any of the people on those planets to notice and put something big in the way to take the hit instead. I mean I know Star Wars isn't renowned for great consistent and realistic physics, but we know that ships with the fastest hyprdrives in the galaxy still take a decent amount of time to cross the galaxy. Looking to A New Hope again, they were playing games on the Millennium Falcon to pass the time while they flew from Tatooine to Alderan. So how fast were these Starkiller lasers going? Every answer just leads to more questions, and they just never showed any interest in answering those questions.
It was so painfully annoying when they shrugged his backstory and character off in Rise of Skywalker as a clone Palpetine made which brought up even more unanswered questions all because they shrugged him off in Last Jedi. You can’t set up a character and have no pay off. This is what people mean when they say there’s no structure to these Star Wars sequels. If you weren’t going to and answer these questions then don’t set up the mystery in the first place. This is on them for hiring Abrams to do the first movie because he’s notorious for doing this Mystery Box approach in his films and then hiring another guy who’s notorious for subverting things and going against expectations in his films. It’s not going to clash well when people want to make different movies with different intentions. It’s on them to find common ground and write a compelling 3 arc story.
Oh my. It's a good thing I subbed and clicked the bell on your videos. It's like the people for the New star wars never watched the original Trilogy or Prequels. Which is why all the fans of Star Wars were in a uproar.
Snoke was a rip off of Palpatine, plain and simple. Similar to how they ripped off the Death Star with "Starkiller Base," the Rebel Alliance with the "Resistance," desert planet Tattooine with "Jaku" and on and on and on. He even appears before his apprentice as a hologram for God's sake.
Palpatine was the shadowy master of the Empire. He was the Empire. He didn’t need an elaborate back story, just as is said here. His power was felt the galaxy over, mere mention of him was enough to frighten even hardened officers, and it says enough about him that even men like Tarkin and Vader feared his wrath. He will always be a vastly superior villain to anything Snoke could have ever been.
Before I jump to any conclusions on if the Snoke character was handled properly or not, I would have to watch the final film. Perhaps it was a decoy or force projection giving the illusion of his death, and not him really dying? It's too early to cast any final judgment on the character and the new trilogy as a whole until the story is finished...not that I have high hopes or anything.
Three years later, we’re STILL sitting on the realization that he was just a failed clone body of Palpatine who survived the fall into the Death Star II’s reactor because “something something Dark Side”.
Snoke's back story is that he was cast out by his people for being an evil jerk. then he weaseled his way back in on the back of a gullible Jedi and the kid who was fated to end the Jedi hold on power in the Republic. his finest moment to date was an impassioned speech before the big bowl of aliens that gave Palpatine HIS power. Mesah sure of it.
@bigbenhoward lots of blame to go round. maybe if we hadnt been so hypercritical of what we thought was a "mascot" we didnt notice him using the force all through the first movie.
@bigbenhoward maybe, [and I mean no insult] you were a kid when the second series came out. we shit on that character HARD, I am guilty too. but I watched a fan made doc a couple weeks ago that pointed out all the stuff we missed. then it made the connection I am embarrassed I didnt see myself: Jar Jar is a master of Drunken Sith. the doc points out all the times Jar Jar is, for no good reason, JUST in view of the camera while dialogue is going on. and sure enough when some non force user is talking, he is mumbling and gesturing with his hands. like he is using the Mind Trick.
@bigbenhoward this guy explains way better than I can, he also puts some comparisons up on screen so you can see it in real time. ua-cam.com/video/1rHyf0FBvt4/v-deo.html
@@mikeemmons1079 Honestly, that would've been horrible. Who could take Jar Jar serious as a villain, least of all THE main villain behind it all, especially after having seen Darth Maul in the first episode? It would have ruined Star Wars and the image of the Sith forever. According to the theory, he would have taken Dooku's place. Imagine Anakin and Obiwan fighting Jar Jar instead of Dooku, it would be silly and take all the tension and seriousness out of their confrontations, not to mention we would never have had Christopher Lee's performance. I like the prequels, and there seems to be evidence for such a plot to have been a thing once, but I'm honestly glad Lucas scrapped it if it was the case, although a duel between Darth Jar Jar and Yoda might have been kinda cool.
from a technical point of view i think you are right - leaving snoke under developed does leave a lot of plot holes and unanswered questions on the exposition level. It might cause a bit of a distress to those more technically oriented but i believe snoke to be really just a backdrop character without too much significance to the essence of the story or the main ideas jj ab was trying to convey - the whole trilogy was about the subversion of the old Nietzsche's 'will to power' vs Buddhist zen - Apollo / Dionysus - sith/jedi dichotomy (cookie for you if you guessed who's each one) and in that sense - snoke, is instrumental to further the plot. mostly as a gambit, as a character whose death signifies the death of the old world (and he did die), support character at best if you insist. snoke is supposed to be a relic , a remnant of the old philosophies - developing his backstory and motivation and 'but how did he do all that' isn't very relevant to the essence of the plot. kylo ren is the real antagonist here to be perfectly honest that's just my hot take on it, i could be dead wrong. would be happy to engage in a civil discourse.
Snoke can never EVER achieve anything on par with Palpatine for one simple reason:
He was not the senate.
He's also seemingly completely dead.
He was named. Names give identity. Names are a shackle on characters, a lack of a name( hence a title is a good workaround) gives a freedom of backstory.
Wasn't it because Snoke didn't have UNLIMITED POWEEERRR ?
@@barrybend7189 That explains the Dollars trilogy.
He also wasn't terrifying.
The Spaceballs empire is more competent than the First Order. :/
All hail President Skroob!
1, 2, 3, 4, 5? That's the same combination I have on my luggage!
The Sith Empire was more competent than the Forst Order.
@@donder172 The sith empire also had compelling characters like Darth Jadus. Heck, the player character had more advanced morals too.
Well of course they were. They actually had the competence to watch the movie they were in to find the heroes. Too bad they didn't watch all the way to the end.
Deliberately design a character to be mysterious and inspire speculation.
Tie him to almost every unanswered question when it comes to "how did we get from Return of the Jedi to here?"
Kill off said character like a chump mid-trilogy, answer nothing, make it painfully clear there is no overarching story plan, "your Snoke theory sucks."
*Genius*
Clearly anyone who doesn't like it just hates women.
And racist, too.
Honestly, they've lost a lifetime fan because of that. They can't handle real criticism and instead decide to fling shit at their fans with false, virtue-signalling accusations of racism, sexism, being white males with no lives (because bullies never said that to me growing up). This is indicative that they're the real bullies. And I for one will never pay another cent to a bully; I know what it's like to have my lunch money taken, and this territory is all-too familiar.
The Gru meme would fit this comment perfectly.
@@kaisertreu6276 LMAO 😂😂😂
@@QrazyQuarian I feel the exact same way. They lost me too. And it is sad, I felt very insulted as a fan.
I won't watch 'Rise of the Skywalker' until it is a free movie on a flight or something like that
In the original trilogy, the evil Empire was the status quo that needed to be broken. There were enough references to the "glorious past" of the Republic for the audience to put the picture together: there was a good government back in the day, enforced by the heroic Jedi, then the evil manipulator Palpatine showed up and duped everybody. Nobody sits down and spells it all out to the viewers because that would be boring, but there is enough information about it that you can figure it out. The prequels basically just added detail to what was already mapped out. And the original trilogy's conclusion basically points at the return to the former, good status quo of the Republic. The fundamental problem with Disney's movies, IMO, is that they just invalidate the victory of Return of the Jedi by pulling Empire 2.0 out of nowhere, just because the writers have no imagination to come up with a new threat.
To elaborate on that, Snoke needs a backstory because at the end of ROTJ we, the audience, were shown that the galaxy's history was going in a completely different direction: totalitarian regime defeated, Republic restored. And instead of seeing the ramifications of that, or perhaps a vicious fight for supremacy between several factions trying to fill the power vacuum, we are given a new totalitarian regime firmly in place and the Rebels now calling themselves the Resistance and even more the underdog than before. It is almost as if we missed an entire movie, or trilogy, that would show how that happened.
What info did the original movies to give you to make that connection?
Salty Socks Mainly what Obi-Wan says to Luke in his hovel before they find Owen and Beru, plus a lot of what is said between Imperial officials on the Death Star.
No, they didn’t.
That's what I didn't like about the new movies, and even the original book series to an extent. There is a serious question about whether the galaxy would have been better off without the rebellion. If Palpatine was still in charge, with Tarkin managing the government and Thrawn the military. Everything might have turned out better in the books, and it almost certainly would have been better in the movie series.
Palpatine didn't need a backstory because he WAS the backstory.
The backstory shall decide your character.
I AM the backstory.
Not yet
Then enters the prequel trilogie
Palpatine was most pathetic thing in original triology aside from ewoks and lets arrest people who have no qualm killing us supposedly evil stormtroopers.
@@milicevicx9686 Eh, you must be talking about Fantastic Four or some other garbage trilogy because you sure as hell can't be talking about Emperor Palpatine :)
@@milicevicx9686 No
"Your Snoke theory sucks... but it's still better than what we're going to give you."
"Shotgun version of the Death Star"
*ROFL*
Death ShotStar
If you read legends comics the Galaxy Gun did the same thing as Starkiller Base, but the Galaxy Gun could only fire one shot at a time.
@@nfrandom007 You mean by like using a sun as ammo?
No,by blowing the sun into....wait,that was the starkiller prototype,nevermind
I gotta be honest. That sounds a lot more awesome than presented in the movies.
To paraphrase Razorfist, there was no way in hell Snoke would ever be able to match or be on par with McDiarmid's performance as Emperor Palpatine. McDiarmid nailed that role backed by more than 40 years of stage experience. No matter how much speculation was dumped into Snoke and his past, all he did was a shallow, pale imitation of what Palpatine could mastermind in his sleep.
Watching Razorfist shows that you have 0 argument.
@@Dragonage2ftw I'm not arguing, I agree with LD. Snoke just isn't scary or threatening.
Lucky Fox Andy Serkis is a pretty experienced actor as well, and for motion capture no less. Not sure if the argument over the amount of experience holds up here, but the role probably wasn’t in his ball park
That’s probably why Ruin Johnson gave up on his character. “Awe, how am I gonna make Snoke cooler than Palpatine? I’ll just kill him off so I don’t have to worry about it!”
I've heard of Razorfist, but I've only recently started watching his channel once I learned that he is a big fan of pulp fiction. (Not the movie) I have to say his commentary on culture is always interesting.
There's also something more that Palpetine had that Snoke didn't...Build-up...
The Emperor was mentioned in A New Hope - the guy in charge of the Empire just swept away the senate; meaning there is no longer a branch of Government that he must peddle to in order to get what he wants. He now officially holds absolute power over the entire Galaxy.
Now think about what we saw in the original Star Wars all the way up to the midpoint of Empire; from what we saw, Vader was the badguy - the main antagonist of the entire franchise at this point. He was big, scary, had a dark costume, an emotionless face, and he killed Obi-Wan after torturing Princess Leia. He's the kind of guy that can crush a man's windpipe with ONE hand. Vader is a scary and intimidating force...
So that being said...when he's so desperate to catch the Millennium Falcon to the point of losing ships in an Asteroid Field, WHAT does he do when he learns the Emperor is calling him?
He immediately moves the ship out of the field to send a clear transmission, and when he takes that call...for the first time ever - we see VADER - the big bad of these movies - fall to one knee...Vader fears and respects THIS guy, because THIS guy is SO far above him; and he shows that dedication and respect by being punctual and not making mistakes or slip-ups. And when we see Palpetine for the first time, he's projected as a large, intimidating blue hologram, shrouded in darkness - making Vader look so tiny by comparison.
THIS is the guy who is REALLY in-charge of everything. And even though it greatly conflicts with how he is in Return, the portrayal of him is meant to further evoke a mysterious vibe from him, and an almost inhuman like quality to his eyes.
This guy was intimidating if he had someone like VADER so terrified of him. And what's even worse is, by the end of the movie Vader reveals his plans to overthrow the Emperor - meaning that he is incapable of moving against him ALONE without Luke's help, because of HOW much he fears the man.
And we as the audience should too, if the opening of Return is any indication with Vader talking with the Commander on Death Star II - the mere acknowledgement that the Emperor himself is coming to the Death Star legitimately terrifies the guy, to the point where - despite he knows his resources are exhausted - he will somehow double the efforts of his workers...
And Vader's threat against the man, describing the Emperor's attitude and methods as being LESS forgiving than his own, are a clear indication of what the man is capable of...
Even YODA was afraid of this guy and warned Luke not to underestimate him...
Then of course, every scene he's in shows that Vader is intimidated by him and we can see how visibly uncomfortable Luke is by being in the man's presence. He taunts Luke and goads him like some sadistic bond-villain, until finally a fight between father and son breaks out...all the while, the man is cackling maniacally - entertained by the proceedings.
All of this builds up to a reveal of his terrible power - the Force Lightning; something that we didn't even know was possible.
All I'm saying is...Palpetine had build-up that led to a satisfying pay-off...
Now let's look at Snoke...
I gotta be honest...he's mentioned like...ONCE in the Credit Scrawl of Force Awakens...and then, by the time he's mentioned again half-way through, he's suddenly revealed in the next scene...It's kind of jarring like -
"Whoa, who the fuck is this guy? His name is Snoke? What the hell kind of a name is Snoke? This is Star Wars! Pick a better name!"
And truth be told, Snoke is one of the most eye-rolling things about the movie, because it seemed SO desperate to once-again retread the same territory for Star Wars; this guy was just another Palpetine down to a T...but I kept thinking that MAYBE something interesting or unique would be revealed about him...
And something was...His Fashion Sense is terrible...Instead of being a cold, intimidating presence in The Last Jedi...he instead wants to be "SHINY!" - just have him be voiced by Jemaine Clement and we're as good as done.
That's the thing about Snoke...there was no build-up to him. He's just THERE...so matter-of-factly; just like the First Order, they were just "there"...I don't think Disney Lucasfilm understood the fact that there were NO movies coming in between this trilogy and the old one. And regardless of what they might think, Lucas structured the first trilogy intentionally with holes to be filled in later by the prequels. But just having what is effectively a facsimile of The Empire, the Emperor, and a brand-spanking new Death Star...it genuinely comes off like nothing has changed; like the efforts of the Rebels from the Original Trilogy were all pointless, because the Empire wasn't ever defeated.
And of course, with a movie about a lonely orphan Kid on a Desert Planet, who finds a valuable droid with valuable information, having to escape the Planet on the Millennium Falcon, meeting with Han Solo and Chewbacca, and of course forming a parent-child relationship with an older mentor-figure, only to have that Mentor-Figure killed by a masked man cloaked in black - who has a long personal relationship with him - all on a Massive Planet-Destroying Super-weapon...
Yeah...I just stopped caring at a point. The moment I saw Star Killer Base, I immediately gave up on the movie.
I also remember the reactions of the rebels when Mon Mothma revealed that the Emperor would be on the new Death Star. That really left an impression on me that I´ll always have in mind when it comes to good old Palpatine.
"insert Moana's Crab God Thing Song Here"
His clothes in The Last Jedi reminded me of Goldmember...
To add to this: Snoke showed up in an existing franchise. If this was a genuine reboot simply retelling the story of Luke Skywalker as an alternate universe (aka the JJ Abrams Star Trek reboot) or even a completely different series, Snoke might have been more acceptable as simply the mystery box. Call it "Galactic Battles" or something other than Star Wars, since it isn't. Spoof a similar look to the Star Wars universe like Space Balls, but as something completely different in its own universe it might be fine. It would still have problems and your observations here might be accurate.
Unfortunately for Disney, they are stepping into an existing universe. The *reason* why fans are interested is because they see the Millennium Falcon, Han Solo, "General" Leia, and even Luke running around. They want to know "what happened after Return of the Jedi?" They want to iknow *that story* and it is why they are paying the bucks to watch the movie.
Unfortunately, that question is only partially answered and Snoke comes out of nowhere to make an appearance. That is why his backstory is so vital, since it makes no sense that it could even exist after the Republic was restored. Luke represented.... *a return of the Jedi*. That is what the final movie in the trilogy promised and that the Jedi would once again take their role in safeguarding the Galaxy. Apparently Luke even started a new Jedi academy and was training padawan... and what became of them exactly?
I won't go into the rest of the major flaws for the two post-ROTJ films as they are numerous and frankly missed opportunities in storytelling too, but this should have simply been made as a separate film outside of the Star Wars universe to get any sort of valid credit with Snoke as presented as a "mystery box". They didn't have the luxury but want to have their cake and eat it too. If you want to call this a sequel, then make it continue the story... which this did not.
@Xenovista Wrong. While it did start that way, George gradually evolved with the events and eventually wanted to tell the story that led into the OT. To remake the Star wars story from the simple Evil Empire vs plucky Rebel shtick, into the tragic space opera about the fall from grace and redemption of a hero.
And he always had something more he wanted to add or fix. Every creator does. That's why he did the special additions.
Moreover, while the movies made a lot of money, that was nothing compared to the toys, games and books. All of which told stories of a universe not his own. He always considered the EU as a separate universe, similar to the Marvel or DC multiverse.
Disney: Do you have any bad guys for sale?
Lucasfilm: Ah yes we have the emperor. A powerful and cunning sith lord. Manipulated the senate and the seperatist to gain absolute power over all galactic systems. Built a super weapon and an army in secrecy, used the jedis own against them and wiped out all oposition.
Disney: ...Do you have anything cheaper?
Lucasfilm: We have snoke. Hes some guy...
Disney: SOLD!
muskatDR Disney: *comes back* Hey so I broke that Snoke super quickly, it was incredibly underwhelming. Can I buy the Emperor now? I need a villain that’s scary and we have too many shirtless scenes with Kylo Ren for him to be the main villain.
Lucasfilm: Ah, Okay. Was there at least some sort of lead u-
Disney: No.
Lucafilms: No lead up? This is one of the greatest cin-
Disney: Don’t care, the Rise of Skywalker needs to make money and I don’t care what we ruin to ensure that happens.
"Fashionably stupid" has to be my new favorite phrase; I'll just put that right up there next to "sheeple". You sir, are brilliant. Thank you.
Ok. Snoke could be fixed in my eyes with one line of dialogue. "When the empire fell. I felt like I was the last fragment of it. Now with what I have learned in secret. I have rebuilt the empire." That is a win win. His backstory is still mysterious in how was he connected to the empire, was he a stormtrooper with force sensitivity? Was he related to the emperor? Was he a royal gaurd taught in the darkside? Was he an assassin or inquisitor? We don't know but it explains 1) how he became a master of the darkside, 2) he is a leader and knows about the empire, and 3) it can give us a reason on how he built the first order up. It was a simple as that. You still make him mysterious and gives context oh how he got the power he has.
The First Order needed a lot more explanation than it got.
If you hear "Empire", you know what it is and if you hear "Rebellion" you can deduce what it is if you put in on relation to Empire.
What is a "First Order"? The name implies a religious group. Is Snoke worshiped like a god? What is the "Resistance" resisting if it works with the Republik? We needed a lot more explanation to understand what is going on.
The First Order being a bunch of Darkside fanboys doesn't really seem that far off in canon. Remember, everyone there thinks that the Empire is an alright thing...and take that sentiment up to 11.
@@ZKP314 The Empire wasn't darkside fanboys. Remember that officer on the Death Star who made fun of Vader for believing in the Force (I find your lack of face disturbing)? Most Imperials did not care the Emperor was a wizard or did not even believe it.
@@schwarzerritter5724 I said the First Order were darkside fanboys, not the Empire.
Then again, at this point, there isn't much of a difference anymore.
"First Order" I think fast food...my "Frist Order" of french fries.
Having the First Order be a religious (or possibly a cult) faction would probably be better and make Snoke different than Palpatine by not being just another dark side force user. That and maybe also remove the connection between the Resistance and the New Republic. It would probably be better, because then the Resistance is a group that are fighting against what seems to them at least to be a really powerful army, and all of this could happen with the Republic being in the dark on what's happening and they could then have the sequel trilogy build up to the Starkiller base finishing it's contruction so that the First Order could use it to deal a massive blow to the Republic before their attack on the galaxy.
Palpatine needed no backstory because he was originally called The Emperor. Palpatine was hidden by a title. Snoke on the other hand was named. A name gives specifics.
using game logic The boss name was "emperor". Palpatine would be under that word with smaller letters.
I think the word you are looking for is Title. Names (like maul) are powerful put titles are also important.
I think the answer to Sidious's backstory can be even simpler: everything we need to know about him is made plain via the foundation provided in the original trilogy. There is an Empire, and it has been established that he runs it. Vader is a Sith, a long line of force users who wield the Dark Side. Sidious is his master, the dark equivalent to Yoda, and a more powerful Sith Lord. What more do we need to know about him? Nothing! Everything is plainly relevant from the moment he steps off his imperial shuttle.
Snoke, on the other hand, has no such foundation. There are many unanswered questions, many things we need to know. The Sith are dead, so why does he know the Dark Side? Why is he so much more powerful than Sidious or anyone else? What is his monstrous species, and where did he come from? Why do the First Order follow him instead of some human politician? And why on earth didn't we ever see him before? Where was he during the war between the rebellion and the empire?
The difference is foundation. Palpatine had all he needed, while Snoke was nothing but a giant unanswered question...just like the sequel trilogy.
Oh and by the way: why was such a powerful Sith lord, the titularly leading antagonist, so easy to kill. With him in place, there is no way Kylo-Ren could have been the antagonist. The story-telling was crude, amateurish, patchy and needlesly convulted; in the process caricaturing Luke Skywalker, the seminal protagonist of the whole series.
"Why is he so much more powerful than Sidious or anyone else?" - Except he wasn't. (At least shown.)
Do you really think snoke can match Unlimited pOwEr in any way? 😅😃 I mean there were many occasions when a powerful sith (Not more powerful than Sidious) such as maul and some ancient sith too were able to live even after being slashed in half by a lightsaber.
Snoke just couldn't keep up.
Palpantine got a backstory, he was implied to have risen up through a war for control. A war which Luke's father fought in as explained by Obi-Wan. Why wasn't his backstory stated? Because Lucas knew how to write well, it's called show, don't tell.
And also because he was the empire itself he was the cause for the war.
Snoke was individualized from the first order, he's the master of it, he somehow changed Kylo Ren, which means he has an origin which means it needs to be explained.
The emperor in the orginal trilogy is the empire as I stated, he is the personification of tyrannical order, he is the plot
Though I've only just discovered you today, I have been enjoying the library of videos, especially the character archetype videos.
Why?
Right? Such great stuff.
@@Dragonage2ftw Hello again, troll. Hope you have fun here.
Thanks! I'm glad you're enjoying the videos. I might start dabbling into reviews where I'll talk about character archetypes, writing styles, and other tropes that might be of interest to the creative community.
Same
Does JJ even know that his Snoke was doomed to a premature death by Johnson??? Was he being indifferent, did he even make object, was he too confident with his mystery box BS??
He probably expected the next movie to be his chance to answer questions, until Johnson came in flipped him off and destroyed everything
@@maverickdarkrath4780 exactly. There was a backstory and treatment for the trilogy filled with answers, but they were all chucked out by that Petulant Prick.
@@maverickdarkrath4780 I still don't understand why Disney couldn't stick with one director and instead went on a route of Ryan and JJ being too busy undoing each other's plot decisions to actually make good Star Wars movies.
JJ actually was a producer of TLJ. He just didn't care.
In fairness, J.J. Abrams probably DID have at least some vague idea for a backstory for Snoke before Rian Johnson decided to take The Last Jedi in a more... contrarian direction. Not saying it would necessarily have been good, but it would certainly have been better than NOTHING. What you're saying here ties in very well with my biggest problem with TLJ. It doesn't tie up narrative threads, it burns them. The only explanation for any of the mysteries is, "it was all random and meaningless." It's like the movie was actively mocking people for getting invested in the new trilogy. "You were interested in this plot thread or that character? Screw you, it doesn't matter!" It's hilariously bizarre for anyone who didn't care about the story, and infuriating for the people who did.
Agreed. Instead of making Abrams the focal point for the outcome of the entire trilogy Kathleen Kennedy has given JJ a pass. Especially when Daisey Riddley came out and stated JJ had a treatment for not only 8 but 9 as well and that Rian choose not to keep any of the ideas. I don't see how the mess that is TLJ is on Abrams.
No, I'm not willing to give JJ Abrams a free pass on this.
He's the one who gave us Mary Sue, Emo Boy, and Screw-My-Interesting-Backstory. He's the one who decided to make Luke a pathetic runaway with a whopping 30 seconds of screen time. He's the one who basically pushed the reset button and make the first movie all over again. He's the one who forgot to take the time to build up the world we were watching, making it feel small, confused, and pathetic, not grand and imposing.
Sure, _The Force Awakens_ isn't *as* bad as _The Last Jedi_ , but JJ was the one who filled up the dumpster with bags of gasoline-soaked manure, all ready for a lit match.
That said, the person who is _really_ to blame for all this is the Dark Empress who selected both directors and green-lit their decisions.
I'm not giving JJ Abrams a free pass at all. He did do all the things you said, and it was all because he wanted to remake A New Hope with muh representation without worrying about whether it actually made sense as a sequel. I'm just saying this particular instance with Snoke did not go how he'd planned it to go. I believe he's said as much in interviews. So you've got two directors, neither of whom were given any limits or guidelines, playing tug of war with the story. It's astounding that Disney higher ups were this totally careless about a franchise this massive.
Agreed.
@@davidh.4944 im not gonna say that he didn't copy ANH beat for beat but at least he had some interesting ideas and characters that could've been great if handled correctly but as previously stated Rian Johnson threw out all of JJ's plot threads and outlines for eps 8 and 9...who knows what his original plan for this trilogy was it could've been great if given more care is all I'm saying. It had potential🤔🤷♂️
For me, when I first found out who Palpatine was, I assumed since he's the Emperor, he started how the Empire ran things. There wasn't really a need for an explanation. The prequels later came and expanded upon the character. That's really all there was to the Emperor and that was all that was needed. The guy who started it all, and upon his death, it all ends.
Snoke on the other hand, is this powerful being who came out of the blue and was later killed off pretty much as fast as he was introduced. On top of this, unlike Palpatine, Snoke was built up big time. He was also so powerful that Luke Skywalker was afraid of him. Luke (the man who decided to go toe-to-toe with Darth Vader, the most feared man in the many galaxies that the Star Wars cannon exists in) was afraid of this guy. Even then, Vader was nothing more than a puppet to the Emperor. The Emperor was able to keep Vader in line. Luke wasn't even afraid of the man who was a step up in the ladder of people to fear.
You don't just introduce a character that the most optimistic character in the series is afraid of and don't explain who he is. Iguess you can do that if you want people to hate your movie. Oh wait, that's what Rian Johnson set out to do: create a movie people either love or hate.
Snoke ended up being nothing more than a Palpatine wannabe.
"It's good to learn from your mistakes, but its even better to lear from someone else's mistakes"
Thats godamn right.
It is always fun to speculate and use our imagination to come up with stories on our own, and wonder what things would be like if we had seen them on screen. The Clone Wars, first mentioned in A New Hope, did that. People started wondering what it was about and what adventures could have been told at the time. It was fun and exciting. The Clone Wars wasn't vital to the plot, but helped it move along, and gave us a small glimpse into something much larger as to who Luke's father truly was.
When the character of Snoke was first announced, we were told he was a powerful being from another galaxy, who had been around and watched the rise of the Empire, and waited for his moment. It was not the fans that made this up. It was 100% fact given to us before The Force Awakens was released. We were told these things about Snoke, fanning the flames as to who he was, where he came from, and exactly how powerful he is.
Rian Johnson has gone on record stating he had already plotted out The Last Jedi before The Force Awakens was released. He had not even seen the film, but decided to take the characters and what he knew before, and plotted what he wanted. He essentially created his own "What if?" fan film that was somehow approved.
Even if it is revealed Snoke is not dead in Episode IX, and it's all been a farce of him pulling strings, it will feel false and a blatant turnaround, attempting to correct mistakes and errors in The Last Jedi. Say what you will about George Lucas, but he wrote and had the entire original trilogy plotted out before even filming. He even had aspects as to what he wanted to do with the prequel trilogy. Sure he changed some stuff here and there, but in the end, he knew exactly where Luke, Han, Leia, Obi-Wan, Darth Vader, and Palpatine, were coming from, and their journey as to how it was all going to end.
I want to correct you on something: George Lucas did not have the entire original trilogy plotted out before filming. He had the first movie plotted out before filming. When the fans wanted more that is when he worked off of what he established in the first film to plot out the next 2 films.
This is why if you only watch A New Hope the movie feels complete on its own as its own story, because it was designed as a stand alone film. This is also why Empire Strike Back does not feel like a complete film on its own, and why Phantom Menace did not feel complete on its own.
@@TankHunter678 No. ua-cam.com/video/mwizHbh9WEY/v-deo.html.
Disney should uncanon ,ep8 and 9 and reset back to ep7 or start a whole new trilogy .
Or just let the franchise die. That would be the kindest thing to do and this is coming from a Star Wars fanboi.
Yep
@@jovenc4508 or get the disney executives so drunk on whiskey that they sell it to someone who actually wants to canonize the legends.
*NO.* The Force Awakens damaged Star Wars as badly as The Last Jedi.
They ought to bring back Legends while they're on it.
Imagine if Snoke had extreme natural skill in some kind of Dark Side version of the Jedi mind trick, to the point his own master was terrified of him. His master locked him away in some kind of life-support system and forgot about him. He was trapped for so long that he became permanently scarred, pale, and physically weak. But over time, and by using an ever growing connection to the Dark Side to manipulate events around him, he got free. Eventually, by setting up connections in the Empire during its rise and after its fall, he had amassed a force comparable to the late rebel alliance. After the empire was destroyed, Snoke brought together all of the survivors, as well as some new people who hadn't been involved in the first war at all, and re-attempted to establish their political power. Snoke had no issue corrupting anyone who disagreed with him, except those with a strong connection to the original alliance to betray it. His first order of business was to find a suitable apprentice. Due to his own experience with natural talent surpassing learning ability, he attempted to find someone who had a strong connection to the force and found that Kilo was a perfect match. The only issue with him was that Luke was already teaching him. After weeks of manipulating both Luke and Kilo to put a strain on their relationship, he caused Luke to attack Kilo, resulting in Kilo running away to Snoke's arms. Luke then runs off to his island, not because he hated the Jedi, but out of shame for what he had done and fear that he would do it again.
Well hes dead now,
And so is the franchise.
"The imperial senate will no longer be any concern to us. I have just received word that the emperor has dissolved the council permanently, the last remnants of the old republic have been swept away.. ..The regional governors now have direct control over their territories.."
This line of dialogue give us more insight into the emperors character than all of episode 7 and 8 put together gave us of supreme leader snoke's.
And more importantly it's a "mystery box" done right. It shows actual world or in this case galaxy building. how does the emperor maintain control? he has a chain of command being appointed governors. There used to be a republic but now there's an empire with him at the head how did that happen? doubled with darth vader's complete obedience the dialogue tells the audience the emperor is extremely powerful, ruthless, and should be feared.
we get none of this with snoke. now imagine if when luke went to bespin in episode 5, the emperor was just there with vader for some reason and in the very first scene of us the audience seeing the emperor not through a hologram but physically there FOR THE FIRST TIME, vader kills him without having to fight either him or luke. that is exactly what happened to snoke with rey and kylo. i love star wars, but these sequels are so poorly written it really is a shame.
Basically, a character backstory or lack thereof can be summed up by how many questions arise from the character and how many are answered.
Palpatine: How did he become emperor? He did evil shit and rose to dictatorship. What is his goal? Crushing the Rebellion to solidify his rule of the galaxy.
Snoke: in a post empire, sith, and jedi world, what rock was he hiding under all this time... where does he come from? Hmm. How did he unite the first order? Hmm. How did the first order even form? Hmm. What does he *really* want to do? Hmm.
An Emperor facing rebelliom is kind of self explanatory, even without a Moral duality explanation. It is a dictatorial political seat warding off an populist uprising. Everything he comes from, is and wants is pretty easily assumed and the prequel trilogy showcases those natural assumptions in detail. There aren't many questions that needed to be answered surrounding him for the audience to understand. Snoke, by design as a mystery box even, is nothing but intentionally unanswered questions that are to be fulfilled later(and never are)
This is a great summary of what reasonable people inherently understand.
The amount of justification that fans of the Sequel Trilogy, and specifically 'The Last Jedi' engage in, is staggering.
Palpatine is not even a named character in the original trilogy. The name "Palpatine" was introduced in the prequels. In the original trilogy he is simply referred to as "the Emperor". There was no need to name him, because there is only one Emperor. When Tarkin says: "the Emperor has dissolved the Council permanently" nobody asks "which emperor?"
This would be like if we got prequels first and Palpatine wasn't in them at all, and then when we get to the original trilogy he's just there. With no explanation.
I'm glad you brought up Star Wars' pulp origins. So many people forget this, to the point where a lot of EU novels read more like sci-fi than the pulp space fantasy Star Wars is suppose to be. I also think it's a factor left out of the narrative of the sequel trilogy. The sequel trilogy -- particularly the first film, The Force Awakens -- was a nostalgia product, but it was a nostalgia product for a piece of media (the original Star Wars trilogy) that itself was a nostalgia product, tapping into the thirty year nostalgia cycle by updating the old pulp serials to a modern era. That makes The Force Awakens a copy of a copy, which to my mind goes a long way toward explaining its many failures. So you have a film in the 2000s trying to mimic the 80s by copying a film from the 80s that itself was updating a genre prevalent in the early to mid 20th century and ... well, let's just say some things got lost in translation. Then The Last Jedi comes along and purposely subverts all the classic tropes that are the very essence of Star Wars. The whole thing makes about as much since as turning the next Indiana Jones film or Conan comic into a romantic comedy.
The big mistake is that in this trilogy I don't even have the sense of danger for the heroes. I know that they have already won since Rey defeated Kylo in SW 7 without reason. They have never lost a single battle.
Palpatine was a major threat in the original trilogy. He built a Death Star, destroyed planets, destroyed the Rebel base and forced them to find another (Hoth), only to root them out again and again (Endor). He kept finding them whatever they did. He controlled Vader, who inspired fear throughout the whole galaxy. And in the end, he amost killed the main hero by Force Lighting, a new power we had not seen in the previous movies.
Snoke on the other hand, had so much potential to be a great villain. But, he was sacrificed for nothing. I don't care about his backstory. But I care that he was presented as a mysterious powerful villain and they threw him away like this. The Ewoks were more of a threat than him. And now, in the last movie we are left with Kylo Ren who has never won a lightsaber duel and looked like he had a hard time with Snoke's guards. He lost to an untrained Rey, but he killed almost 20-30 of Luke's fully trained students.
Take notes from Marvel's Thanos. That's how you make a true villain. And everyone was pleased, because the role of the villain is to inspire fear for the safety of the hero. Otherwise, it's just boring.
Sorry for writing so much guys.
Snoke also needed a backstory to separate himself from Palpatine because otherwise he comes off as just a rip off version of Palpatine's character, which is exactly what he was.
I think the biggest difference is the following:
When Episode 4 came out there was no established world. Nobody asked "Why is there an Empire? Why is the Emperor in charge?". It was a new world where everything was possible.
But the situation in Episode 7 is drastically different. You can't just create something new. It also has to fit with everything that's already there. And Snoke and the First Order just don't fit at all.
In all honestly, I really wish I had discovered you months ago, but I am glad I found you recently.
Your channel is so insightful. You have helped me understand and perfect my writing more. Please don't stop making videos.
A New Hope did the right thing and provided context for the Emperor both as a figure and as antagonist without even needing to _show_ him. Just in the conference room scene with Tarkin and Vader, they explain the Emperor's methods, goals, and effectiveness in only a few lines of dialogue-
1. The Imperial Senate is no longer issue, it's been dissolved, so the last remnants of the Republic are gone. Democracy no longer exists, and the words "swept away" implies that this action did not require any real effort to execute.
2. The Empire does not require the bureaucracy offered by the senate any longer. It will instead rely on regional governors to control their sectors and enforce the will of the Emperor, aided by the fear generated by the existence of the Death Star. So the Empire's, and by extension the Emperor's, methods revolve around a simple concept- cow them into submission, or vaporize them entirely.
In just _these lines alone,_ we can gather that there is an Emperor, and that he is a classical tyrant who uses fear and destruction to oppress people. It didn't need any sort of buildup or tremendous backstory to explain, because it wasn't relevant to the plot.
In the same vein, Sauron is ultimately the main antagonist of Lord of the Rings; but while there _is_ an immense backstory that goes over his existence and rise to power, it's not relevant to the plot of the events the Third Age. The movie spends a little time explaining that he forged the Rings of Power, and then One Ring to control them; and that he was challenged and defeated by an alliance of Men and Elves. Then it goes on to say that as long as the One Ring persists, Sauron will be able to return to Middle-Earth. This constitutes only a fraction of a percent of Sauron's history, but it's all we need to understand both the story and the stakes.
Snoke doesn't get to have this treatment, not when plot points concerning the rise of the First Order and Kylo Ren's tutelage are centered around him. The burden of nearly _any_ sequel is that you must be able to bridge the gaps between each movie consistently, if not effectively; and not handwave them with a half-assed explanation (or in Snoke's case, no explanation at all).
I love all of your videos. Not only do you bring up all the good points, but you do so in a precise and easy to understand way. It doesn't take you 40+ minutes to explain things. Love it! Keep it up.
I'm honestly just commenting for the algorithm. I've only recently discovered your content, and I'm loving every second. You deserve 1 million plus subs and I hope they find you.
I completely agree with you. Great video. Palpatine didn't need a lot of backstory considering the threat of the empire. Every time the empire did things effectively it showed palpitines strength. Due to background info that explaination works with palpatine not with snoke
Kinda funny stumbling across this after having seen Rise of Skywalker, where Snoke's backstory is revealed and it's even stupider than we thought.
Imagine, if you will, a hypothetical prequel trilogy where Palpatine didn't exist, was never made reference to, and was never even named. Instead, Chancellor Valorum takes the role of villain. It otherwise plays out roughly the same; RotS ends with Anakin burning to death on Mustafar, the Republic in ascendance with the Jedi expanding their power after the failure of Order 66, and the Chancellor has his powers limited. Now imagine the OT plays out exactly the same (Palpatine and all) and see how many logical inconsistencies you can spot.
The Emperor didn't get a backstory in the OT because nothing about his existence or abilities contradicted previous film events (because there were no previous films to contradict). We knew everything we needed to know, and when we went back for the prequels, we got enough information to understand how he ended up the way he did.
Snoke, otoh, shows up with immense dark power commanding a supposedly shattered imperial force on par with the old empire and takes the galaxy practically overnight.
Very well argued, I’ve really been enjoying your content. And for anyone who wonders what “Snoke done effectively” might look like, please let me point you to Timothy Zahns original take on Grand Admiral Thrawn.
I actually like Snoke and Episose VIII, but this really explains why his lack of past is an issue.
Thanks for spelling it out so clearly!
Even in the early days, they DID have a backstory for Palpatine: he was the last leader of the Republic before it became the Empire. The Prequels only expanded upon that backstory, but it was already there in ancillary materials during the run of the Original Trilogy.
I did not at all mention that there was nothing before or aftet the OT to cause problems, Sequals are SEQUALS if it breaks things it's not the originals fault, aswell as prequals are technically sequals because they came later, problems they bring up is not the fault of the OT, its bad writing in the prequals
Abrams is a one-dimensional writer who lives perpetually on the crutch of "to be continued".
That's why people call him Jar Jar Abrams...
Great videos! Criminally under viewed.
Disney's star wars movies are not cannon IMO
Disney star wars trilogy is NOT a part of star wars universe. 😇
Some thing from I remember from the ending of Mass Effect 3, one of the creators quoted Agatha Christie about mysteries. Honestly I can't remember the exact quote, but it was to the effect that you should never revile all the details of and leave people wondering. This does NOT work for sci-fi, and sadly too many major productions these days are following this advice too much, and not as a way to bring intrigue, but as a way to be lazy.
That's a really strange concept to apply to scifi indeed. The whole point of scifi is that it's essentially a Socratic exercise and as such your what ifs need how do'es.
The same can be said for any story that has boatloads of world building in fact. The world of Middle Earth for example would be a lot less interesting if there did not exist answers to a lot of its mysteries.
Agatha Christies argument is something that can apply to short stories and horror flicks. But not something that is grand.
@@TechnoMinarchist yeah, I agree, sadly it is easier to cut corners for some people.
Imagine if they did a sequel trilogy to Lord of the Rings and the new movie opens by telling us (emphasis on TELLING us) that the victory of "The Return of the King" was undone by some new villains. Like, we're not shown how they did that, they just did, roll with it (even though the good guys keep kicking their asses in the same way the First Order does, they're terrible villains despite being meant to be better than the Empire, like "WE HAVE A STARKILLER BASE SOOO MUCH BIGGER AND STRONGER THAN THE DEATH STAR" ->gets destroyed by the end of the film... "WE HAVE A BIG BAD DREADNOUGHT" ->gets destroyed by the end of the scene... "WE HAVE A SUPER DUPER MEGA STAR DESTROYER" ->gets destroyed by the end of the film) and to top it all off, we learn nothing about this new villains who undid the victory of the original trilogy, they get killed in a quick and underwhelming way.
...This would NOT be okay with people.
Your explanation of plot relevancy makes me think of the Monogatari series by Nisioisin. When it was adapted into an anime by Shaft, they stuck to that idea by pretty much never having another person seen in the background who aren't the main characters or have relevance for the story. Even if it does, they have no real defining features, except enough for us to get an idea of who they might be at a glance.
in the words of someone on the Audemars Piguet marketing team: "to break the rules, you must first master them".
They should have had the Grysks be the villains of the new trilogy. Or the Yuuzan Vong. Either would be a credible threat, with the Grysks' incredible mind-breaking powers, or the Yuuzan Vong's immunity to the Force.
The part at 8:50 is excellent advice for any writer that hopes to make their own story. I've failed more times than I care to count on a lot of stories. It came down to my inability to make a relevant, structured, well written plot with a hook. This changed with a recent story, and unfortunately, I've come down with a serious case of writer's block on how to advance the story. With the last scene I've written for the story, things seem wrapped up, which wasn't my intention. Now, it's a problem. I have to find a way to not undo what I've created, but add to the narrative that has been built and enhance that narrative while "delivering" on the story I want to craft for my readers. The next chapter is only a month old since the previous one, still writing it, however, at the same time, playing the devil's advocate, that month long hiatus can lose people if it appears I'm no longer interested, willing to deliver, or if I deliver a crap plot enhancement.
There are so many tools at the writer's disposal. It's like gazing at the tool section of [insert favorite improvement store] and trying to decide if you need a hammer, hacksaw, circular saw, or just a simple screwdriver to tighten some loose ends.
When I saw The force awakens and The last jedi, I thought Snoke's ideology was different than all sith. I think it would have been interesting if he was revealed to be a Light side force user. Someone who strives for Domination and control through order and temperance just like the old republic jedi.
That is an amazing idea and would've resulted in an intriguing backstory and motivation for Snoke. Sadly, an idea that cool would require the writers to do something fresh and inventive rather than rehash old ideas, which isn't something the Star Wars franchise has excelled at. The track record for original ideas was pretty piss poor long before Disney came along.
Fun fact: Palpatine does have a backstory even if it isn't essential to his character in the movies. It just gives details on how he rose to power. He was a cruel rich kid on Naboo who discovered he was a prodigy in the force. He later killed his entire family because he saw them as being in the way and he would fall under the mentorship of Darth Plagueis who honed his power and assisted in devising the plan to take over. It's interesting but, as I said, doesn't effect his character as the ultimate bad guy.
The first few movies were still a new thing on the market, there was just the three movies, some comics, and that was it. Palpatine didn't need much of a backstory considering
A: The universe we were presented with was a half dozen years old, the world wasn't as polished even for the time, nor did it need to be. And even then, Snoak came in after what, 40 years of story? The audience has had literal generations to devour star wars and between the requels, the games, and everything else the story was far more fleshed out and didn't have as much room for mystery.
B: The way he was presented was enough to let us know who he was and what he was about. He got more than a handful of scenes to just be mysterious and then die. Whereeas Snoak just raised a bunch of questions like "who is he and where did he come from?" Palpatine let us know through story, where as the story of the new "trilogy" (if disney doesn't cut their losses with SW9) built up Snoak as a mystery, and then cut that mystery away as another one of the "subversion of expectations" which ultimately did the new stuff a disservice.
Palpatine wasn't introduced until episode 5, where episode 4 had given us an introduction to the universe and the state it was in. From there in a story standpoint he was able to stand on his own two feet from there. Meanwhile Snoak was pushed in at the end of 7 where he was jammed into what was essnetially the first act of the new story where we're being once again introduced to the state of the world. Setting him up in a place that arguably made him a bigger deal than the emperor, just to cut him down with no fanfare, and show that Mar-rey sue and discount vader as "even more awesome than what came before them".
What I don't see alot of people mention is that Sheev didn't appear onscreen in Ep. IV, appeared briefly in Ep. V, and was finally introduced in Ep. VI. All the while, he was mentioned throughout the first two films as a prominent figure before actually showing up in the flesh for the third. He was somewhat of a mystery box himself at the start of the OT, but he was gradually BUILT UP for his big reveal in the LAST movie. Yes, we wondered what the details were as to how he became what he was, but those details didn't really matter, because the simple answer was: Corruption from Darkness. That can work for a villain in a relatively binary 3-part story. Introducing a villain in the 7th part of a complex 9-part story with no context and then killing him off in the 8th part DOES NOT work.
I found a novel of Return of the Jedi dated back to when the movie actually came out. It blew my mind that in the novel way back when, Lucas already decided that Palpatine was a chancelor who gained far more power then he should have had. This of course is a direct reference to Hitler, rising from a chancellor to Fuhrer. I asked my Dad and uncles about what they knew of Palpatine as kids, a couple of them mentioned that they knew Palpatine was in some manner a politician who gained more power similar to Hitler. They couldn't remember where they got this idea, they think it might have been from cards or the toys even. Or maybe it was even a more subconcious assumption. He is the Emperor of an Empire, a Senate was mentioned very early on as no longer having any power, and with all the WW2 German army designs incorporated into the Empire it is easy to come to the conclusion that the Emperor was not born an Emperor but seized power himself in some manner.
But Palpatine DID get even more characterization and backstory, before even appearing in person. Remember the scene of officer's meeting on the Death Star in New Hope? What is the first thing that Tarkin says after entering? That Emperor dissolved the Senate and Empire (dictatorship) has completely erased any remnants of the Republic (democracy). Regional governors have absolute power now and they are to rule through fear of the Death Star. This shows Palpatine as a ruthless ruler with virtually unlimited power and means to enforce it.
The last time I saw a video praising the sequels was uploaded on April 1st
Palpatine is just like fire lord Ozai in ATLA. He didn't need to have a complex backstory, all we needed to know was that he was the evil ruler of the fire nation, and he filled that role perfectly. And due to the things said about him throughout the series, by the time Aang and Ozai fight, we are aware of just how dangerous and powerful he was.
Every time I hear your theme song at the end, it reminds me of an episode of Star Trek Enterprise episode Vox Sola.If you listen to the first tones of her trying to use the UT on the alien creature the pings sound like the ones in your music.
memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/Vox_Sola_(episode)
Who was Snoke anyways?
who cares?
Exactly.
A FILTHY CONSERVATIVE
eng3d that guy whose cantina got one star on Yelp
Supreme Leader *W O K E*
I remember me and my grandfather having a half hour long conversation about who the hell is he
9:01 Lost was a series built entirely on broken promises. That’s the reason why I’ll never trust JJ Abrams as a storyteller again. He fooled me once with Alias, and fooled me twice with Lost. He won’t fool me a third time.
Your advice at the end is golden. Thanks for including it
I think a big reason is because the Star Wars universe originally existed in a contextless void.
Once the newest movies came out, Star Wars has context galore and Snoke played a very important role and needed context.
This video essay brings a lot of valid points of what to do as a writer to be unique. And not copy your favorite films for me it .Star Wars he says "But it's even better to learn from someone else's mistakes" literature devil
He's right in every sense of the word
Palpatine had one other important moment of exposition that added to his role of the "ultimate BBEG" right before passing away Yoda told Luke to "never underestimate the power of the emperor". That seven words alone give us everything you need to know about Palpatine´s position within the empire and his power, if even a wise and old Jedi Master like Yoda is cautious, maybe even afraid about him.
Similarily to the problems with Rey, Snoke´s Backstory could be kept shrouded while still revealing plot-relevant details. There are several planets within the unknow regions that harbor old Sith temples. Similar to Darth Bane, Snoke could have learned from the knowledge stored there to become the powerful dark lord he is established to be and within the Force lies the answer to him leading the First Order: he just needed to subjugate or manipulate the imperial forces and then condition future generations to unflinching loyalty (they get trained and indoctrinated from childbirth so that is not unreasonable) and since he hold dominion over the military forces, he could also control the population by means of fear. The imperial forces spend several years or even decades in the unknown regions before reemerging as the First Order so there would be enough time to establish an economy or to restructure an existing one to supply his initial push and then draw from planets/groups that are still loyal towards the empire within the new republic. Most plot-relevant questions can be explained away by this while still keeping the most important question unsolved: Who is he, what is his relation to Palpatine and what does he plan to achieve?
This way we still get the Mystery-Box but there are less possible plot-holes to fall into.
It was still an idiotic move from Disney to kill off their BBEG mid-trilogy in such an anticlimatic way.
Good points. But I would also argue that it is not always the case that you OWE the people an answer. Sometimes, questions are better than answers. Sometimes answers aren't good enough. Allan Moore knew this when he wrote V for Vendetta. He knew that a reveal of V's identity would never be satisfying. He knew the question was stronger than the answer. David Lynch also knows that. He HATES answers.
I would argue though, that you have to give the audience something. That can be multiple possibilities for an answer. theories based on little snippets given in your story. If the search for an answer ends in a discussion amongst fans and many fan-theories, that is its own beautiful thing and would only be spoiled by a straight answer. That being said. Snoke doesn't provide ANYTHING of the sorts. We were given NOTHING. And even if they try to give us more in episode IX, at this point, it's actually too late. You need to do this BEFORE you get rid of the character (even if the death of Snoke ends up being a fake-out). After the death, it just feels like a retcon and excuse.
I think another difference between Palpetine and Snoke is that, when you watch 'A new hope', you're new to the world of star wars. When we heard of Palpetine he was already part of the status quo. We just didn't know what the status quo was yet, so why would we ask questions about him.
When Snoke came into the picture, we already knew the world of star wars and how we left it the last time. So when the sequels start with a completely new villain in an already known world, it's hard to accept that without knowing how he came into the picture.
It would be like the prequels ending with Yoda defeating Palpetine. In 'A new hope' everybody would have a backstory, but it would be hard to accept Palpetine as the villain without explenation because that's just not how we left this universe the last time.
It's a sort of "Because it's there" kind of writing.
Why was snoke even in the trilogy? Did he do anything with plot significance? Seems like the big bad should have just been Palpatine from the start
The mystery revolving around Snoke's identity was one of the best things of The Force Awakens. It was more fun to speculate who he might be and where he might have come from and what he might want then watching the movie. And The Last Jedi destroyed it all. They probably didn't find a good solution (which had not already been discovered) themselves, so they went with this "Your Snoke theory sucks" narrative, hoping they could pull off a new "I am your father" twist. But it didn't work at all. Really disappointing as The Last Jedi had the potential to really add to the Star Wars lore in a positive way. Instead it killed Star Wars and possibly forever... 😕
Neither Snoke nor Palpetine necessarily needed backstories, but they certainly help. Palpetine got away with it because his character was actually intimidating and powerful. Snoke was just a mysterious guy who did barely anything directly and died such an anti-climatic death. Palpetine was a threat, Snoke was a plot device.
When he said palpatine's backstory i thought he was going to tell the tragedy of darth plagueis
... the Wise
"Nobody's Emperor"... I about fell out of my chair.... LMAO!!!
A student of the Dwarti, darkside Force users who were powerful and influential politicians and scholars when the old republic was young. And the Emperor’s contingency plan laid out in aftermath explains that he did in fact appoint a successor in the unknown regions, which is why the imperial remnants went there in the first place.
Granddaddy had a saying, "A fool doesn't learn from his mistakes, a smart man will but the wise man learns from those other two's mistakes & his own."
Another thing people forget is that part of this was a refrence to Rome. Rome was once a republic and there were desires to turn it back into a republic. So there was some historic tropes Lucas was pulling from.
Abrams....nothing. Just like what was in his mystery box.
Absolutely loved your explanation of this problem. You're one of the only people I have come across to convey the real problems of the franchise in a straight-to-the-point manner while adding those last few bits at the end that had to be said. Its true that I feel like I have the opinion of a "toxic fan" when I point out the inconsistencies of the current Star Wars saga, its kind of like that game "We Happy Few" where if you're not taking enough joy, the citizens of Wellington Wells begin to turn on you and hunt you down while yelling "Downer!" at you. If I'm not conforming to the modern ways that we are suppose to recognise in media, then I am nothing but a basement dwelling, Trump supporting man baby who should be ashamed for believing this.
I really look forward to seeing more of your content as you can argue logically and point out that there is an agenda in media now.
This was a very well thought out and extremely truthful video essay keep up the good work im now subscribed after watching three videos and those three that ive watched all have the descripter at the beginning of this sentence. Thank you
2:03 - 2:04
Make One man weep, make another man sing.
Change a hawk to a little white dove
More than a feeling, that's the power of love.
If you create a villain for book 1 dont create a new villain for book 2 and give him no set up
In A New Hope we learned that There had been a past republic. We learned that the Emperor had finally dissolved the Senate of that old republic.
From just that I can tell you plenty about the backstory of the emperor and even a lot about his behind the scenes actions during the events of the movies. For example:
Though it has clearly been a long time since the Empire was formed, the enduring presence of the Senate shows that the emperor didn't destroy everything at once, he converted the territories he ruled over time, slowly but with a few significant pushes. He now has no fear the the public will feel upset at losing their Senate. He has already through decades of work secured his power so completely he no longer needs the slightest bit of propaganda to tell people otherwise. This interestingly enough coincides with the completion of the Death Star. With the show of complete political power after perhaps a lifetime of planning, he also holds complete military power.
Note that I didn't reference any specific events or statements outside of those two from the very first movie. Two movies before we met the Emperor in the flesh and decades before the prequels which officially told the story of the Empire's rise, the groundwork had been laid. Everything we needed to know about the Emperor and his past could be speculated through nothing more than the most basic world building.
The sequel trilogy lacks that world building. There is no useful knowledge to be gained from discussions of the First Order's operations. They apparently got their soldiers by kidnapping babies and raising them to adulthood. Meaning the storm troopers we see are the first and only generation of First Order stormtrooper, so I guess somewhere they have a secret daycare planet to raise and brainwash future soldiers. So the First Order has literally just come out of nowhere just in time for Ben Solo to turn to the dark side and become one of their leaders, under a super powerful force user who's plan was to brainwash a bunch of babies, raise them into loyal adults without drawing serious attention from the Republic's armies, all while building a gigantic superweapon(with child labor I guess?) again still without drawing any attention from the Republic despite his planet gun being close enough to the Republic capital planets that it could shoot them all in no time at all.
How does that even work? The lasers didn't look like they were going that fast, but apparently it was too fast for any of the people on those planets to notice and put something big in the way to take the hit instead. I mean I know Star Wars isn't renowned for great consistent and realistic physics, but we know that ships with the fastest hyprdrives in the galaxy still take a decent amount of time to cross the galaxy. Looking to A New Hope again, they were playing games on the Millennium Falcon to pass the time while they flew from Tatooine to Alderan. So how fast were these Starkiller lasers going?
Every answer just leads to more questions, and they just never showed any interest in answering those questions.
And now, being back here after TROS, Snoke was utterly mishandled. A shame.
It was so painfully annoying when they shrugged his backstory and character off in Rise of Skywalker as a clone Palpetine made which brought up even more unanswered questions all because they shrugged him off in Last Jedi. You can’t set up a character and have no pay off. This is what people mean when they say there’s no structure to these Star Wars sequels. If you weren’t going to and answer these questions then don’t set up the mystery in the first place. This is on them for hiring Abrams to do the first movie because he’s notorious for doing this Mystery Box approach in his films and then hiring another guy who’s notorious for subverting things and going against expectations in his films. It’s not going to clash well when people want to make different movies with different intentions. It’s on them to find common ground and write a compelling 3 arc story.
The virgin throne vs the chad senate
Oh my. It's a good thing I subbed and clicked the bell on your videos.
It's like the people for the New star wars never watched the original Trilogy or Prequels.
Which is why all the fans of Star Wars were in a uproar.
Well...
Insert Spider Man vs. Spider Man meme here
Snoke was a rip off of Palpatine, plain and simple. Similar to how they ripped off the Death Star with "Starkiller Base," the Rebel Alliance with the "Resistance," desert planet Tattooine with "Jaku" and on and on and on. He even appears before his apprentice as a hologram for God's sake.
His stand must be tower of grey because that was a Massacre.
Palpatine was the shadowy master of the Empire. He was the Empire. He didn’t need an elaborate back story, just as is said here. His power was felt the galaxy over, mere mention of him was enough to frighten even hardened officers, and it says enough about him that even men like Tarkin and Vader feared his wrath. He will always be a vastly superior villain to anything Snoke could have ever been.
Before I jump to any conclusions on if the Snoke character was handled properly or not, I would have to watch the final film. Perhaps it was a decoy or force projection giving the illusion of his death, and not him really dying? It's too early to cast any final judgment on the character and the new trilogy as a whole until the story is finished...not that I have high hopes or anything.
Three years later, we’re STILL sitting on the realization that he was just a failed clone body of Palpatine who survived the fall into the Death Star II’s reactor because “something something Dark Side”.
Snoke's back story is that he was cast out by his people for being an evil jerk. then he weaseled his way back in on the back of a gullible Jedi and the kid who was fated to end the Jedi hold on power in the Republic. his finest moment to date was an impassioned speech before the big bowl of aliens that gave Palpatine HIS power. Mesah sure of it.
@bigbenhoward who says I was joking. we fucked ourselves by reacting to Jar Jar like we did, HE was the Phantom Menace.
@bigbenhoward lots of blame to go round. maybe if we hadnt been so hypercritical of what we thought was a "mascot" we didnt notice him using the force all through the first movie.
@bigbenhoward maybe, [and I mean no insult] you were a kid when the second series came out. we shit on that character HARD, I am guilty too. but I watched a fan made doc a couple weeks ago that pointed out all the stuff we missed. then it made the connection I am embarrassed I didnt see myself: Jar Jar is a master of Drunken Sith. the doc points out all the times Jar Jar is, for no good reason, JUST in view of the camera while dialogue is going on. and sure enough when some non force user is talking, he is mumbling and gesturing with his hands. like he is using the Mind Trick.
@bigbenhoward this guy explains way better than I can, he also puts some comparisons up on screen so you can see it in real time. ua-cam.com/video/1rHyf0FBvt4/v-deo.html
@@mikeemmons1079 Honestly, that would've been horrible. Who could take Jar Jar serious as a villain, least of all THE main villain behind it all, especially after having seen Darth Maul in the first episode? It would have ruined Star Wars and the image of the Sith forever. According to the theory, he would have taken Dooku's place. Imagine Anakin and Obiwan fighting Jar Jar instead of Dooku, it would be silly and take all the tension and seriousness out of their confrontations, not to mention we would never have had Christopher Lee's performance. I like the prequels, and there seems to be evidence for such a plot to have been a thing once, but I'm honestly glad Lucas scrapped it if it was the case, although a duel between Darth Jar Jar and Yoda might have been kinda cool.
from a technical point of view i think you are right - leaving snoke under developed does leave a lot of plot holes and unanswered questions on the exposition level.
It might cause a bit of a distress to those more technically oriented but i believe snoke to be really just a backdrop character without too much significance to the essence of the story or the main ideas jj ab was trying to convey - the whole trilogy was about the subversion of the old Nietzsche's 'will to power' vs Buddhist zen - Apollo / Dionysus - sith/jedi dichotomy (cookie for you if you guessed who's each one) and in that sense - snoke, is instrumental to further the plot. mostly as a gambit, as a character whose death signifies the death of the old world (and he did die), support character at best if you insist.
snoke is supposed to be a relic , a remnant of the old philosophies - developing his backstory and motivation and 'but how did he do all that' isn't very relevant to the essence of the plot.
kylo ren is the real antagonist here to be perfectly honest
that's just my hot take on it, i could be dead wrong. would be happy to engage in a civil discourse.