Rian Johnson Doesn't Care About Star Wars Fans.

I knew it. I knew as soon as the blue credits started rolling. As enthusiastic as the midnight premiere crowd was, I could hear the overwhelming praise underpinned with rumblings of discontent. There was an unease that I could sense more than I could actively discern. I felt it within myself, too. I decided to withhold my own judgement because I had had such a change of heart after my first viewing of The Force Awakens. After the first time I saw TFA, I was heartbroken. I had watched all the trailers and was up to date on all the fan theories, and I felt that the movie was nothing more than a rehash of the old Star Wars. A shell of recycled beats and themes. But after a few more viewings I came to like it more and more. I fell in love with the characters. I proceeded through a grieving process and finally accepted that despite some recycled themes, the movie had accomplished its goal. It rebooted the franchise without ruining it.

This time around, I reserved my judgement for The Last Jedi. I tuned out the rabid fan-base and wild speculation. I didn't watch the trailers or TV spots. The only thing I carried into The Last Jedi was faith in Rian Johnson and Disney. Now after seeing it for the second time, I'm ready to share my thoughts.

Rian Johnson doesn't care about Star Wars fans. In fact, I'm pretty sure that at some point he saw this T-shirt and thought, "You know what? Let's go with that."

And actually, when I googled this image, one of the first images that came up was this:

So I'm actually fairly positive that I'm right. What I mean by saying that Rian Johnson doesn't care about Star Wars fans is that he cares about the story. Not your feelings. Or theories. Or preconceived notions about what Star Wars is or isn't. His script seems to thumb its nose at everything that the fans expected. It subverts everyone's expectations. But that subversion is performed such passion and fiery dedication that it has injected the franchise with new possibility and life. Johnson didn't give us the Star Wars movie we wanted. He gave us the Star Wars movie we needed.

That said, here is a list of ways (good and bad) in which the movie subverted my (and many others') expectations. I believe this is the cause of the divisive feedback the fans have given the movie. Feel free to message me or comment about ways (good and bad) in which the movie didn't go where you expected.

*SPOILERS TO FOLLOW. YOU'VE BEEN WARNED*

1. Rey: Just Rey. No last name. Her parents are no one. In fact, she's not a Kenobi or a Skywalker, her parents are actually scum. I LOVE this. I would have HATED it if she had turned out to be related to someone important. We already have Skywalkers in the story and the story simply can't go on only being about them. It's unsustainable. It would start to get stale. Plus, it is even  more poetic that someone who is "unimportant" can make such a difference. That is what Star Wars is to me. It's not about midichlorians and bloodlines and chosen ones. It's about "nobodys" who grow up to be "somebodys." Also, another way in which Johnson subverts your expectations: Rey is untrained and yet she is strong in the force. Get over it. Luke spent a week with Yoda before he rushed off to face Vader in ESB. Training doesn't equal strength. It never has. Johnson has set up a world in which force wielders don't have to be tamed. They can be wild and instinctual. I find this exciting.

2. Luke: Luke's character is not what many wanted, including Mark Hamill himself. In TLJ, Luke is world-weary and discouraged. He is actively pessimistic about himself and especially about the Jedi. Finally we have an acknowledgement from someone that the Jedi Order are not perfect. They are not saviors of the universe. They are another piece of the puzzle. A balancing force on one end of the seesaw. What both Snoke and Luke know is that light and dark always rise to meet one another in equal measure. And what Luke learns is that this is inevitable. There's no sitting this one out. Also, Johnson subverts your expectations by giving Luke a power no one has ever seen before. Force projection is amazing. It is truly a powerful pacifistic weapon. It is the perfect weapon of a Master Jedi. It fits with what Luke has turned into as a character and allows him to become one with the force. He did plenty of "laser sword waving." Now it's time for another approach to solving problems.

3. Leia: She can use the force. Something we've always kind of known but haven't been sure about until now. I like the idea, but hated Johnson's execution of it. It pulls me out of the movie because it just looks so utterly ridiculous. But oh well. Too late to change now.

4. Finn/Rose: This is the first time we've ever seen a "desperate rebel sneak attack" fail. People universally seem to dislike the whole Canto Bight story line. And I don't like it either, but it does serve the story. It solidifies Finn's resolve to fight for the rebellion and not just Rey. Which brings me to my next point.

5. Holdo/Rebellion: Admiral Holdo and the rebels can make mistakes. Johnson has finally shown us that the rebels can be disorganized, uncommunicative, and prideful. What makes them the good guys is that they still come together to fight for what is morally correct and teach each other. Even if it means demoting and slapping and arguing and scolding. Holdo doesn't need to fill Poe in on the plan. If Poe is going to be a leader in the rebellion going forward, he needs to calm down and make hard decisions. Holdo is able to teach him this in her poignant, brief tenure in the story.

6. Snoke: He isn't a typical "sith." He just wields the dark side and wants to rule. He doesn't need to be some character from previous films. I wish we had a little more information about where he came from, but again, Johnson did what was right for the story. After TFA, the story was headed in a predictable direction. We had an ultimate bad guy with an unsteady apprentice who could have been redeemed. Now we don't. Snoke is dead and the story has room to breathe.

7. Kylo: No one saw this coming. Ben Solo is truly gone. Kylo ain't coming back to the light. This isn't Vader all over again. Kylo is far more chaotic and dangerous than a typical sith. There is no cold calculation in him. He is an angsty, rage-filled sociopath. He scares me much more than he did before. I get the feeling that he will literally go to any length to get what he wants, and that is a bad guy we can love to hate going forward. We didn't like Snoke because we weren't supposed to, but we never really knew his true motivation. We know Kylo. We know how he thinks, and we can understand his motivations. That is a great bad guy.

8. Hux/First Order: Another way in which Johnson has undercut our expectations is by making Hux angry and impetuous. This psychopath now has more power? Snoke always seemed to keep this "cur" in check. But now he's off the leash and doesn't respect Kylo as much as he did Snoke. Again, going forward, this makes the First Order seem that much more menacing and chaotic. This is not the cold, calculating, bureaucratic Empire. This is an organization with an arsenal and an army and there's no telling what devastation they are about to unleash on the galaxy.
  
Each time that I've seen the movie now, I kept thinking, "I didn't even know I wanted this until I saw it." There are some truly breathtaking moments. I've not been to a movie in a long time where everyone around me audibly gasps at what happens. When Holdo rams the cruiser at light speed, everyone's jaw drops. The throne-room scene might just be the best lightsaber battle of the entire franchise. The bombing run at the beginning has given me chills both times. Luke becoming one with the force has made me get a little misty-eyed both times. Even though Leia floats like a witch, and even though Finn and Rose ride beasts that crash through a city, and even though DelToro overacted his character (to be expected), I still really appreciate that Rian Johnson made a Star Wars movie, and not a fan film.

After The Force Awakens I was prepared for more of the same. Now, for the first time in a long time, I am excited about the future of Star Wars. 

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The God of Promises

During the first transfer of my mission in Switzerland, we taught a woman named Tanya Mader. She was our only investigator. We would spend so much time preparing our lessons because my companion knew how rare a progressing investigator was. Her husband and small son would listen politely during our lessons, but never really engage. We were so excited for our weekly appointments. We would pour out our hearts to this woman because we so rarely got to testify to someone who would actually listen. We got even more excited when she committed to baptism. The two weeks before her baptism flew by. She accepted all her commitments and began bearing her own testimony to us. Then, then on Saturday morning of her baptismal day, while my companion was ironing his white pants that he had never used, our telephone rang. After a short conversation, my companion pulled his white pants from the ironing board and hung them back in the closet. Immediately, my mind went to my Patriarchal Blessing. It states that my testimony would be accepted and relied upon during my mission. Even though I had about 20 months left, I still wondered, could God fulfill his promise?

Brothers and Sisters, our God is a God of promises. You probably know this if you’ve read a single page from anywhere in the standard works. His covenants and promises are everywhere. President Spencer W. Kimball said, “There are so many beautiful promises. To read the scriptures and turn the pages, it seems that it is almost all rewards, evidence of living the commandments of the Lord.”[1] We often see the Lord’s promises fulfilled in glorious and dramatic ways. We see this when prophets and people are delivered from oppression, saved from wild beasts or fiery furnaces, and when the enemies of the chosen people are miraculously defeated.

If we are supposed to liken the scriptures to ourselves, we must inevitably ask: could the Lord do this in my life? If he needed to, could the Lord deliver me from physical danger? Does the Lord really care enough about me to perform miracles in my life? In a recent Conference address, Elder Bednar said:

"Is it possible to exercise faith in Him, follow Him, serve Him, but not believe Him? I am acquainted with Church members who accept as true the doctrine and principles contained in the scriptures and proclaimed from this pulpit. And yet they have a hard time believing those gospel truths apply specifically in their lives and to their circumstances. They seem to have faith in the Savior, but they do not believe His promised blessings are available to them or can operate in their lives.”[2]

            When I read these words, I can’t help but feel that Elder Bednar is speaking to me directly. Often I think, “Yes, yes that’s fine for others, but those types of miraculous events and fulfillment of promises only apply to others. People who deserve it more. People who are special. The Lord won’t do that in my life because he never has.” I mean, think for a moment of some of God’s wonderful promises:

“Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.”[3]

“Ask, and it shall be given unto you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you.”[4]

“And all saints [...] shall receive health in their navel and marrow to their bones; And shall find wisdom and great treasures of knowledge, even hidden treasures; And shall run and not be weary, and shall walk and not faint. And I, the Lord, give unto them a promise, that the destroying angel shall pass by them...”[5]

“...though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool.”[6]

Do you really believe that you can find rest in this tumultuous world? Can you really be given special revelatory knowledge from God? Can the Lord really make you healthier? Can the Lord truly erase your sins? Make them as if they’d never happened? The answer to these questions is yes. But maybe these aren’t personal enough blessings.

So instead think for a moment of something personal that the Lord has promised you, perhaps in a Patriarchal Blessing. Do you still believe the Lord can fulfill His promise to you? If you’re not sure, I know of someone who may have felt as you do. His name was Abraham. Wisely, the scriptures not only contain straightforward examples of promise-fulfillment, they also contain covenants or promises that have not yet been fulfilled, or promises that weren’t fulfilled in the way one would expect. The book of Romans speaks of Abraham as “being fully persuaded that, what [the Lord] had promised, he was able also to perform.”[7]

            That is truly amazing when we think of what Abraham experienced. Year after year, he waited for the promised blessing of a son. And year after year, nothing. Surely he prayed. Surely he wept. Surely Sarah felt inadequate. After all, the Lord had promised a son, hadn’t He? Surely one or both members of this couple wondered if Hagar bearing Ishmael was the fulfillment of that holy promise. Perhaps they had misunderstood. And perhaps once they reached old ages they assumed that the son would come in the afterlife. But sure enough, Sarah bears a son in her old age, Isaac. What a time of astonished joy they must have felt. The Lord did it! Against all odds, He did it! The answer to that promise flew in the face of everything they knew about God and the natural order of life. But the Lord promised posterity and fulfilled His promise despite impossible odds.

And yet, a short few years later, Abraham hears this from the Lord: “Take now thy son, thine only son Isaac, whom thou lovest, and get thee into the land of Moriah; and offer him there for a burnt offering...”[8] Even the Lord’s phrasing here is telling. The reference is clear: thine only son. Perhaps Abraham understood Isaac’s similitude to the Savior, perhaps not. Either way, how can the Lord ask this of Abraham? This is the most tender part of Abraham’s soul. Is the Lord going back on His promise?

            Hasn’t Abraham suffered enough? Hasn’t Sarah? Abraham is intimately familiar with the evils of human sacrifice, and this is what the Lord asks? Of all things? Is this not the covenant child? Isn’t Isaac the living fulfillment of a lifetime of waiting? And the Lord asks Abraham to kill his little boy? There is no example in all of scripture that demonstrates so fully what God asks of us as his disciples. The Lord asks for us to lay everything we have on the altar. All of our pride and selfishness and disbelief. And sometimes, just sometimes he asks for that which may be the most precious to us: a child, a parent, a spouse. President John Taylor said: “You will have all kinds of trials to pass through... God will feel after you, and He will take hold of you and wrench your very heart strings, and if you cannot stand it you will not be fit for an inheritance in the Celestial Kingdom of God.”[9]

The scripture reads: “Therefore, they [who profess discipleship] must needs be chastened and tried, even as Abraham, who was commanded to offer up his only son. For all those who will not endure chastening, but deny me, cannot be sanctified.”[10]

            Think about that! We all have to be tried like Abraham in order to be sanctified.  This may sound harsh, but remember the Lord also says “after much tribulation ... cometh the blessing.”[11] So what then is the blessing? What is the point of this suffering? President George Q. Cannon said:

There is no sacrifice that God can ask of us or his servants whom he has chosen to lead us that we should hesitate about making. In one sense of the word, it is no sacrifice. We may call it so because it comes in contact with our selfishness and our unbelief, but it ought not to come in contact with our faith. Why did the Lord ask such things of Abraham? Because, knowing what his future would be and that he would be the father of an innumerable posterity, he was determined to test him. God did not do this for His own sake for He knew by His foreknowledge what Abraham would do; but the purpose was to impress upon Abraham a lesson and to enable him to attain unto knowledge that he could not obtain in any other way. That is why God tries all of us. It is not for His own knowledge, for He knows all things beforehand. He knows all your lives and everything you will do. But he tries us for our own good, that we may know ourselves.[12]

Two things stand out to me from this quote. One, that God knows what we need so well, that he can tailor your trials to fit your exact circumstances. He knows not only what you need, but how you need it. If you let Him, He will teach you things that you wouldn’t be able to learn in any other way.  

And two, God knows you. God loves you. God not only knows you as you are right now, but He knows who you’ve always been and who you eventually will be. The problem is that you don’t know who you are. He does. He isn’t asking you to wait or withholding blessings to torture you. He is trying to teach you who you are. He wants to tell you what He knows about you. You are here to find out what you are capable of.

D&C 132 states “Abraham received promises concerning his seed, and of the fruit of his loins—from whose loins ye are [...] This promise is yours also, because ye are of Abraham [...] Go ye, therefore, and do the works of Abraham; enter ye into my law and ye shall be saved.”[13]

            So what exactly are the promises of Abraham? What did the Lord promise Abraham in exchange for laying everything he had on the altar? And by extension, what has the Lord promised us if we do the same? His promise is of exaltation. Godhood. “For whoso is faithful... They become... the seed of Abraham, and the church and kingdom, and the elect of God. ...therefore all that my Father hath shall be given unto [them].”[14] This is no small promise. Yes, it hurts to lay all that we have on the altar. Yes, it will be the most difficult thing we are called to do. But the promise is sure: everything. You get everything. All you have for all that the Father has is worth it. He promises that it will be.

            With 4 months left to go on my mission, I was in the Mission President’s home for a leadership meeting when the zone leaders from my first area approached me. One of them had a photo in his hand. It was a picture of Tanya Mader, dressed in white. But she wasn’t alone. Her husband was standing with her, dressed in white as well. Today I still carry that picture in my scriptures as evidence that the Lord always fulfills his promises. I know that He can fulfill his promises. Not only do I know it, I believe Him when He promises me all that He has. That’s not to say I never waiver. I’m far from perfect. But I’m getting better at trusting Him. Truly Moroni was right when he wrote: “For the eternal purposes of the Lord shall roll on, until all his promises shall be fulfilled.”[15]  In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.

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[1] Jan.1974, The Rewards, The Blessings, The Promises

[2] Nov. 2016, “If Ye Had Known Me”

[3] Matt 11:28

[4] 3 Ne. 14:7-8

[5] D&C 89:18-21

[6] Isa. 1: 18

[7] Romans 4:21

[8] Gen. 22:2

[9] Journal of Discourses, 24:197

[10] D&C 101:4-5

[11] D&C 103:12

[12] Gospel Truth, 89

[13] D&C 132: 30-32

[14] D&C 84: 33-38

[15] Mor. 8:22

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