Rant part 4
Holdo and the FO vs Resistance fleet continued
Now we'll get to the absurd levels of incompetence the first order show through the whole chase in the movie.
The first order has all of the resistance in one fleet that they completely outmatch. But they decide to wait for the fleet to run out of fuel before destroying the final ship. Time is one of the most valuable resources in War. Those 18 hours you are chasing the three Resistance ships would be allowing the New Republic an additional 18 hours to regroup and reform to defend itself. they are trying to take over the galaxy and the new republic is in chaos after their capital system was destroyed. Such a large fleet would be incredibly useful taking over other key New Republic planets rather than waiting for the resistance fleet to run out of fuel. Kylos fighter blasts straight through the shields that can hold off Snoke massive capital ship and the rest of the fleets fire power for 18 hours Apparently the first order wouldn't even be able to wear down the shields in that time... also if a fighter can do that much damage why didn't they release all of the 1000s of fighters from that massive fleet and tear the resistance fleet apart. Another poor explanation is given saying the fighters had no cover from the FO fleet, but if they can tear through the capital ship shields they don't need it. especially since there would be so many fighters in the first order fleet. All the shields power was focused on the rear of the ships so why didn't they also go and shoot up the front of the ships. The resistance would have been pretty much defenceless. Poe took out a bunch of turrets earlier in the film and Poe does the same in TFA, Kylo should be capable of doing the same given he has the force to enhance his reflexes and he'd have at least 100s of fighters backing him up.
Also why does the main First Order fleet have no chips that can even can't catch up with a resistance capital ship? They're lighter and faster even tho in the OT we saw Star Destroyers catch Leia's ambassador ship and chase the Falcon. The resistance rely on hit and run tactics apparently since even their largest ships can out run all FO ships except fighters they can't be defeated in space they just need to keep running
Why did the first order not call for reinforcements to jump to light speed ahead of the resistance fleet ? if there were none avail why didn't they have some of their massive fleet light speed somewhere else then light speed back ahead of the resistance fleet ? In TFA Han was able to light speed right to the edge of Starkiller bases surface but FO admirals cant even do so in the massive area ahead of the resistance fleet.
This whole plot relys on the resistance capital ships shield being so absurdly powerful yet it seems first order ships never have shields as Poe shoots the hell out of turrets on their large capital ships in both sequel movies. Apparently one of the most powerful ships in the First Order navy hasn't even got a basic shield ? This allowed poe to wipe out all the turrets on a dreadnought. Sure Poe is the resistance best pilot but a dozen or so regular fighters could have done the same. This level of inconsistency is abysmal.
The FO had so many easy ways to wipe out the entire resistance all thought the movie but none of it is ever taken. How are the first order meant to appear at all like a threat when they are made so incompetent ?
Resetting the universe. Empire vs Rebel dynamic achievements of previous trilogies heroes removed
TLJ doubled down on the major mistake in TFA of repeating the Empire vs Rebels dynamic rather than letting the galaxy move on. Somehow The New Republic military was pretty much completely destroyed by Starkiller bases one attack. Apparently the New Republic which controls most of the galaxy had practically no military outside of that one star system. If you re watch the Starkiller base firing scene again you cant even see any large fleets, just half a dozen capital ships. So did the republic just leave themselves defenceless again? The same thing that allowed the separatists to rise up and start the clone wars, at least it made sense when the Republic in the prequels had done that as there had been peace for 1000 years. In the sequels there has been peace for barely 30 years and they have a faction run by a dark sider than bases all its designs of the militaristic and evil empire so many people in the New Republic fought to overthrow. This makes all the higher ups in the republic complete morons. Most if not all would be old enough to have lived when the empire ruled the galaxy, yet they were fine with such extreme demilitarisation with a faction on their boarders that is lead by a dark sider and bases all its architecture and military design of that same even empire that oppressed the new republic. It's like Belgium, France, Poland ect completely demilitarising their countries after the Nazis were defeated and sticking to that even if Germany started to turn into a Nazi run country again. Its well past the point of believable incompetence. It's another case of making everyone incompetent so they can take the story in the direction they want.
TLJ makes the entire Skywalker family irrelevant to the galaxy. The "empire" and the "rebellion" are fighting for control....again. So the entire first 6 movies mean nothing now. Anakin and Lukes arc was made pointless, Vader and Sidious are replaced by two dark siders who seem like sith in every way but title for some reason. Then Luke doesn't even rebuild the jedi order as I've already mentioned.
All the achievements of the original trilogy heroes has been made pointless. The republic is destroyed and all that remains is a small rebellion, the Jedi are gone except instead of two powerful force users to potentially train (Luke and Leia) now there is only one and there are no living Jedi to properly train her. Vader and Sidious were replaced by Kylo and Snoke as well. Instead of creating a new story following the achievements and changes to the galaxy that happened in the original trilogy they just reset the universe...
Rose
So the first major problem i have with Rose is her freeing the space horses which are just going to get rounded up in a few hours anyway but leaving the kids. Either she knew freeing any of them was pointless is which case why free the space horses or she hadn't thought about that in which case why not free the child slaves ?
The Next is Rose meeting and falling in love with Finn in 18 hours. One of the major parts of her character and "plot" is hero worship. She had her idealised version of Finn smashed when she saw him try to escape. Sure he redeemed himself by trying to sacrifice himself but even so falling in love with someone that soon is ridiculous and made worse by one of the major themes of her story and the movie as a whole.
Lastly she stops Finn sacrificing himself. Now i wont bother addressing her dumb line about saving the ones you love because I've yet to see anyone defend it, however it turns her into a completely selfish character doing the very thing Finn was flawed for doing at the start of the movie. At the start of the movie Finn didn't care about the first order he just wanted to find and help Rey. At the end of the movie Rose does something even worse by dooming all of the resistance members to certain death (if Luke hadnt come along which she knew nothing about) just so the person she cares most about can live a few extra minutes before the First Order gun them down. I've seen some people argue Finn would have failed anyway because the laser was powering up. Yes that is a possibility however the chance of that cannon being destroyed or at least being damaged enough it cant shoot through those blast doors is infinitely higher if Finn had crashed into it. The options are A) let Finn sacrifice himself and hope it damages the canon enough. B) Stop Finn from sacrificing himself so instead of just Finn dying all of the resistance dies.
This is more to do with Roses story line than the character. It's built up how complex the system the hacker needs to hack is. Maz only knows of one person who could do it. But Finn and Rose happen to run into a different hacker who can do everything the person Maz wanted them to find could do. Both hackers also happen to be so close by that Rose and Finn can fly off find them and bring them back in 18 hours. You also can't use the argument the force did all this because DJ ended up betraying them which the force would know. Why would he send them to DJ rather than let something unlikely happen so they could meet the guy Maz originally wanted them to meet.