The Real Reason This Last Jedi Scene Didn't Make It Into The Movie
There's a reason one moment in Star Wars: The Last Jedi hit the cutting room floor.
Director Rian Johnson took to Twitter to address one of the film's more ridiculous scenes, which didn't make the final cut of the film. The scene shows Rey (Daisy Ridley) rushing to save the Caretakers, who inhabit Luke Skywalker's (Mark Hamill) remote planet of Ahch-To. Although Luke warns her that sometimes it's best to do nothing, she rushes towards them at full speed, with lightsaber in hand.
However, when she arrives, the Caretakers are... simply having a dance party. Even R2D2 has joined in, much to Rey's obvious chagrin. When she confronts Luke about the apparent prank he pulled, he simply tells her he didn't think she would run quite so quickly.
Here's why Johnson ultimately cut the moment from the film, and why fans are still even discussing this silly scene today, years after the film hit theaters in 2017.
Johnson's decision to cut the scene was pretty simple
The issue came to light in April 2020, when Twitter user @logan_swish retweeted user @brehaorganas, who said they were "thinking about this deleted scene today." Logan wrote, "Somehow this is the first time I'm seeing this deleted [scene] from #StarWars #TheLastJedi, and I've got to say that I love it! @rianjohnson, I'm sure there was a reason this was cut from the final film and would love to hear about why!"
Johnson quickly responded, and explained his reasoning: "Mostly pace, and something about it always felt a little repetitive, coming at a point in the movie where we want to hit the gas and start escalating towards the finale. I love the scene, it was a tough (but ultimately good) cut."
Though the moment is pretty silly overall, Johnson still had plenty of moments of comic relief in his film, including the opening where General Hux (Domhnall Gleeson) and his First Order generals try to act tough against Poe Dameron (Oscar Isaac) with middling results. But it still makes sense that this deleted scene, which was probably closer to the film's big climax, didn't make it into the film.
The Last Jedi was controversial from the beginning
If Johnson had left this scene in the final cut of The Last Jedi, it might have caused even more uproar. Unfortunately, Johnson's take on Star Wars, which served as the middle film of the sequel trilogy, drew derision from fans, in part due to the fact that Johnson took some serious narrative risks. By claiming that Rey's parents were "nobodies," killing the trilogy's main villain Snoke (played using motion capture by Andy Serkis) in the middle of the film, and introducing the idea that anybody could be a Force user even without having Jedi lineage, Johnson tinkered quite a bit with Star Wars lore — but ultimately, his revisions didn't stick.
When J.J. Abrams returned to the director's chair for 2019's The Rise of Skywalker, he essentially retconned all of Johnson's changes, giving Rey a famous lineage by making her Emperor Palpatine's (Ian McDiarmid) granddaughter, and even restoring the helmet that Kylo Ren (Adam Driver) destroyed during The Last Jedi.
Luckily, Johnson was able to rebound from the negative fan reception to The Last Jedi (which still managed to gross over $1 billion worldwide) with Knives Out, a star-studded murder mystery that dropped in late 2019. Partially inspired by the backlash he faced over The Last Jedi, Knives Out was a critical and commercial success that might even lead to a new franchise for Johnson, who's obviously getting the last laugh.
In our humble opinion, The Last Jedi in no way deserves all the hate — and if you haven't seen it for awhile, you can give it your own reappraisal. It's currently streaming on Disney+.