Oh, one of The Great Zontar's threads? Okay then, I'll roll with it.
Disney are still helping to make the MCU, so they don't need to do a damn thing (MCU > Star Wars these days). I think I kinda hated TLJ, but even if Kathleen Kennedy realised maybe starting a new trilogy in one of the biggest franchises in cinema history
without a defined arc was a terrible idea, they've made their stupid, senseless bed and so they have to lie in it.
Or, rather, JJ does when he - forgive the mixed metaphors - has to untangle the mess left in Rian's paradoxically 'subversive' yet utterly gutlessly conservative wake.
TLJ was a critical success, as well as a commercial one, so, yeah... They really don't need to do anything.
As Mike and Jay (who both weren't exactly gushing about the wheel spinning TLJ) from Half In The Bag quipped, the screeching man-baby fans won't be happy until they've all scripted their own version of TLJ, resulting in everyone having
their film - and no one will be happy as everyone will still be bitching about everyone else's versions... It's the future of nerd culture! Self-entitlement and misery for all!
Annoyingly, every time I actually start to really pick apart TLJ I begin to sound like a screechingly self-entitled man-baby fan... so I should just stop here. I mean, awesome. They made a film to get people talking, at least. Like a house made from meringue and staples, I can respect that it's definitely a talking point.
Ogoid said:
(Emphasis mine.)
Turns out escapist fantasy for its own sake, regardless of how much one is assured such a thing does not exist these days, is something most people can enjoy.
Fancy that.
So an author of a work claims it as one thing, and that's all it is? Is your relationship to art so horribly reductive?
Critique of art is always a tricky thing, and I certainly don't fall into such a reductive, lazy trap (authorial intent would largely nix vast swathes of commentary and discourse through the ages), but neither do I wholly roll with the death of the author approach. Being mindful of what amounts to both ends of the spectrum is usually best. Frankly, both approaches can 'explain' or help make sense of Tolkien's work in different ways.