Patrick (H) Willems is a YouTuber who posts on movies (you've possibly seen his series on hypothetical films directed by incongruous filmmakers, such as, What if Wes Anderson Directed X-Men?) I posted a link to his Paddington review about a month ago, him making a video on why it's so great. He also loves The Last Jedi, and has posted a couple of videos about it, why that's great, and why people who dislike it are wrong.
Why are people so wrong all the time?
Down in the comments sections... hoo boy, well this was bound to get at least a little contentious... down in the comments sections they have other ideas. I can't just watch a film anymore; I also have to look it up and learn more about it, and well I guess YouTube comments sections are kind of the same way, for me to interface with this content.
A rough overview of the "anti-Patrick" camp comments is this: they say that when the videos are talking about negative criticism, he's attacking straw men; that he's taking for granted and dissecting the idea that TLJ isn't a bad "movie," just a bad "Star Wars movie." That the critics against the film (at least these ones) don't see TLJ as bad Star Wars films, just as bad films period. Which is a matter of opinion, as it always is, but, where in the world are they getting such notions? It's bizarre.
I'm genuinely trying to understand how people could hate The Last Jedi.
At least they're just being wrong, instead of actively being terrible to people. There are worse things in the world to be, than wrong.
But seriously looking at the comments and suggestions as to why TLJ may have been a bad film, I'm getting, aside from "not understanding the characters" or whatever: it's tonally inconsistent. A lot of people didn't like the humor, or maybe they would have liked it, had not the humor been placed where it was.
I didn't get that one at all.
Are critic-y people and movie buffs such as I, just naturally more likely to be alright with tonal whip-pans than mainstream audiences? Are people who don't watch that many films, or only watch mainstream faire, more sensitive to mood whiplash? Me, I love jarring tonal shifts. I watch a lot of Bollywood, and it happens there all the time, and you just learn to roll with it, and it makes the final product all the more epic in the long run. And so is my failure to see any mood whiplash in TLJ, even when specific examples are pointed out to me, a result of mood whiplash desensitization? And is that why I don't mind that? I don't know.
The other point, anyway. Maybe The Last Jedi doesn't understand its characters...? I'd have to rewatch The Force Awakens to see if the characterization was as thin there as I remember it being. I love that movie, of course, but I remember it being very much, not self-contained as far as characterization went, like say A New Hope was. I'd been going to do that today, actually, but instead I cultivated curated and annotated a selection of t.o.'d YouTube comments in an attempt to understand the viewpoint being portrayed therein. It's the good life.
View the curated list HERE.
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