Is it okay
to do spoiler posts for The Last Jedi
yet? There's stuff I want to discuss and first and foremost is the
clarification we get on what the First Order actually is so BEWARE,
SPOILERS BELOW!
One
job I felt The Last Jedi
did very well was clarify what the First Order is. It helps that most
of the rise of Trump and the fallout of Brexit happened inbetween
production of Episodes VII and VIII because the exact dynamics of
this sort of fascist nostalgia movement are better know to us now.
I'm not completely throwing Abrams under the bus here but I feel we
have a much better handle on where these characters are coming from
now the banal mechanics of this sort of thing are better known.
It
all starts with that first scene of Hux (a character best described
by a tweet I saw calling him “the personification of British
foreign policy circa 1950”) breathlessly informing a subordinate
that his orders come directly from Supreme Leader Snoke. You can just
feel the daddy issues pouring off him as he says it.
Then
there's Kylo Ren going full-on Reddit MRA incel negging pick up
artist on Rey with his “You mean nothing to anyone except for me”
routine which is a textbook emotional manipulation device.
Meanwhile
there's Snoke himself sitting on his throne in his Hugh Hefner
dressing gown going so far as to describe how he's manipulating Hux
right to Ren's face to make Ren feel special and valued even though
its also pretty much how he's manipulating Ren.
There
are those who feel that reducing the main antagonists to an old man
blatantly and shallowly manipulating two needy manbabies into
repeated acts of pointless aggression devalues them somewhat.
Have
these people met the modern far right? Because that's a pretty
accurate portrayal of what they are nowadays. The last US election
presented a New York real estate billionaire as the
anti-establishment candidate who would make it socially acceptable
for white people to say “Merry Christmas” again and build a wall
to keep those Mexicans out of all those border states who ever so
slightly economically rely on immigrant labour. My own country
regularly mistakes the likes of Boris de Pfeffel Johnson and Nigel “I
love foreign tax havens but not foreign people” Farage for salt of
the earth sorts who understand the struggle of the working man
because they said something mildly amusing on Have I Got
News For You or drank out of a
pint glass for a photo op.
So,
yeah, portraying the foot soldiers of the right wing as easily led
useful idiots bowing to any authority that flatters their personality
defects strikes me as pretty bloody fitting right now.
And
that's really effective. It can't be denied that Hux, Ren and the
First Order in general are a threat. They kill a lot of people over
the course of the two movies. They hunt the Resistance to the point
of extinction (there may be more space puffins on the Falcon than
dissidents) They have access to huge numbers of weapons and, let's
face it, pathetic young white men with access to huge numbers of
weapons are something that especially US audiences have reasons to
have anxieties about.
So,
yeah, I liked all of that. Nice to see someone portraying the fact
that these people are completely pathetic and yet a genuine threat to
life and limb. I feel that sometimes the awful harm these people are
capable of causing is diminished by how bloody stupid they are and
perhaps that mixed message has helped them achieve as much power as
they have.
No comments:
Post a Comment