AN: It is hard to argue that Star Wars Episode VIII was a good film, let alone a good entry in the series. As such, here is my attempt to rewrite the film into a decent film that follows the lore and laws of physics of the setting. Most of the film could have been salvaged by better writing. Notes are present in bold italics to justify changes.
The Resistance base is in a panic, everyone trying to bring everything to the transports to escape even as the First Order ships are firing on the planet. There is a discussion between ranking officers.
"We should have known they would have started sending out their armies as soon as they fired the first shot," one proclaims.
"It was the only way they could try and seize control before the collapse of the Republic splintered the galaxy," another agrees.
(Without something to justify the continued presence and numbers of the First Order the events of Last Jedi make no sense.)
One of the pilots rubs up.
"Admirals, we've just lost the last of the Y-wings."
"Do we still have the experimental bombers?"
"Yes, but-"
"Then get them prepped!"
(If the idiot was so obsessed with a WWII film style slow bombing run approach, he could at least have established a reason for there to be a lack of Y-wings, and making the replacements experimental provides allowances for them to not function as well as expected.)
Ships launch, Poe attempts to distract the First Order bridge crew.
Hux remains composed throughout.
As Poe claims the transmission isn't working, he glances at the comms console, before returning his attention to tge screen.
"Mister Dameron, I can plainly see that you are receiving, and will not raise to your bait. We, the First Order, will give you one last chance to surrender and benefit from the order we bring to this chaotic galaxy before wiping you from its face. Pass that message on to your precious princess."
(Before he was reduced to comic relief, it was Hux that clearly held the Order together. Snoke passed his orders to him and Ren, while Ren was an unstable child who did his best to screw up everything he was involved in through his tantrums. As such, it was Hux who was the cold and capable one to keep them functioning. Turning him into a laughing stock meant the Order should have self-destructed by the halfway point of the film, let alone reach episode IX.)
The battle ensues as in canon, with the last bomber managing to destroy the capital ship despite the railgun assisted bombs (merely dropping bombs from a bomb bay only works in gravity, and in the film there wasn't enough gravity for the bombs to accelerate to a useful speed) hitting further back than ideal. As the explosions tear through the ship, there is enough time for escape pods to launch, getting picked up by the Orders lesser ships.
The Resistance celebrate.
And then the other capital ship emerges from hyperspace.
When Dameron returns to the cruiser, it is one of the admirals, rather than Leia, who rips into him about the now utterly pointless sacrifice of pilots and bombers.
(Could well use hotto for this.)
The Resistance fleet makes the jump to hyperspace, only for the first order to follow, launching long range attacks to keep them from landing.
A group of ships break off to target Resistance sympathisers on the planet while the fleet makes another jump.
It is here that Finn awakens, with Dameron leading him to the admirals discussions, with admirals on other ships present via holograms, where we see Leia order the fleet to split up when they return to normal space, to try and force the First Order to either choose one of them to target or at least split their forces so their ships have a better chance to survive. One of the other admirals warns that haven't been able to refuel fully, and have a limited number of hyperspace jumps left.
Finn and Dameron are noticed and sent from the bridge before anything further is said.
Cut to Luke and Rey.
He receives the lightsaber, an odd expression on his face.
"The Resistance needs you," she tells him. "I need you to train me."
Luke sighs and sets down the lightsaber rather than throw it over his shoulder (it is the iconic original lightsaber after all. You can't just mistreat it like that and expect any Star Wars fans to be happy) before walking away.
"You don't need me," he tells her wearily. "If there's one thing I've realised since the Empire, it's that the galaxy doesn't need Jedi."
Rey follows him, to try and convince him to train her, even if he wants to remain in exile.
Cut back to the fleet.
None of the ships want to make the jump until they are all prepared with the proper facing.
One of the First Order bridge technicians asks which to follow, Ren immediately responding by indicating the Mon Calamari cruiser with Leia aboard, with the competent officer reluctantly agreeing that it is the best option.
They make the jump, the First Order following the cruiser.
(This avoids the whole 'the First Order were wiped out in episode VII only to be far stronger than they ever were in VIII while the Resistance were wiped out in VIII only to be able to fight back still in IX' issue. Plus watching the slower ships, such as the medical frigate, getting destroyed during the chase is just painful.)
When the hyperspace jump finishes, the First Order launch their ships against the cruiser.
Ren gets the bridge in his sights, preparing to try and kill Leia, but hesitates, and one of the other Ties takes the shot, killing most of the bridge crew and jettisoning Leia.
(Notably Ackbar survives due to being on a different ship, as such an iconic character can hardly be killed off with basically no screen time or anything to show that they died.)
Here, instead of Leia just using the force to save herself, we see her using a force meditation technique to keep herself alive, with Lukes voice to show how she learned the technique.
This keeps her alive long enough to be rescued, but also justifies her being put out of action.
The Resistance fighters and cruisers turrets fend off the First Order, putting them back into the chase.
Aboard the cruiser, hotto takes charge as the highest ranked member of the Resistance both on board and conscious. She also notes that only have the fuel for one hyperspace jump left, and even then they need to repair the bridge controls first.
She dismisses the crew without any indication of having a plan.
(Just like in canon.)
It is here that Finn considers the tracker to let Rey find the fleet, and how it would draw her into danger, deciding he needs to take it and leave.
Dameron agrees, but also brings up that the Order might have found a way to track them despite the device being designed to only signal its match. They consider bringing it up with hotto, but come to the conclusion she'd be more likely to throw them in the brig for attempted desertion.
Finn heads to the escape pods, where he runs into Rose.
Instead of claiming to be checking the escape pods, he tells her he has a tracking device he's trying to get off the ship (which is technically true).
She is naturally suspicious and stuns him, as in canon.
When he wakes up, she is dragging him to see hotto.
He admits the tracking device is so Rey could find them, rather than being a First Order plant, and that he was trying to prevent Rey showing up and being captured or killed.
They end up talking and conclude that the lead ship has whatever the First Order is using to follow them through hyperspace, and decide to find a way to shut it down.
They tell Dameron, who agrees to stay behind and get the cruiser ready to escape when they give the signal, arranging a rendezvous.
Insert completely different mission to find the master code breaker, as having the security forces jumping straight to arrest them for landing on the beach rather than try and fine them first and only go for arresting them after they refuse doesn't make a whole lot of sense.
Back with Rey.
Rey manages to wear Luke down enough for an explanation.
He tells her that, after the fall of the Empire, it seemed like every system was calling for his help, as the last jedi.
It was impossible for him to be everywhere, help everyone, but too many planets just let things grow worse while waiting, rather than try to fix things themselves.
When he started training a new generation of Jedi, with the help of what Jedi holocrons he salvaged from the Empire, the galaxy grumbled, but tried fixing things themselves, much more successfully than him.
And then Ben, his nephew, ended up killing the other students, and Luke came to the realisation that his every attempt to restore the Jedi only made things worse, and concluded that Master Yoda had the right idea.
He found a planet that acted as a nexus for the dark side and exile himself there, to act to counterbalance the dark sides influence.
Rey is unsatisfied, from him leaving out why Ben turned to the dark side and that he simply left Ben to do as he wished rather than clear up his mess.
She ends up exploring the island, and sees the infinite copies of herself vision from the dark side nexus, and also tracks down the Jedi holocrons (as paper does not exist in the setting of Star Wars, so Jedi books cannot exist either) in the dead tree.
When she tries using the holocrons to learn to use the force even without Luke being willing to teach her, she ends up opening the connection with Ren, who tells her that he only turned against Luke after he found Luke trying to kill him.
Rey, with her faith in Luke shaken by his attitude, is willing to believe him.
The vision is interrupted by Luke bursting in.
He is angry, and refuses to listen to her, driving her back to the Falcon.
As he leaves, Chewie follows.
When Luke ends up confronted with his old friend, he still tries to refuse Reys training, but ends up with a force ghost (Annakin as the best choice) appearing to convince him as well.
Annakin confronts him with the fact that, while the Jedi were unable to live up to their reputation, just letting the order come to an end rather than reforming them, was the same, mistaken, path that he trod. He continues to state that, with Ren seeking to emulate him, it is his responsibility in part to deal with the situation Ren involves himself in.
Annakin also admits that if he had simply been more honest and forthcoming with the people he knew that the rise of the Empire might have been averted.
Luke accepts the lesson, and returns to Rey to tell her what had actually happened with Ben.
He had sensed a darkness threatening to take hold of his student, and came to observe him in the night to think of a way to save his nephew.
When his light died, and refused to turn back on, he turned to his lightsaber to provide the light he needed, only for Ben to awaken at just the wrong time and react by igniting his own lightsaber.
Rey realises that this had to be more than just bad luck, that somehow Snoke was able to influence events to forge a connection with Ben.
Luke agrees to teach her the basics of using the force, but tells her that he won't be leaving, that he couldn't face Leia after it was his mistakes that lost her both son and husband.
(Having Rey keep demonstrating new abilities without receiving any training goes against the point of having everyone else need the training.)
They send Chewie off with the Falcon and tracker while Rey stays back for training.
This means that Chewie comes to the rescue of Finn and Rose with the Falcon, and it is the smuggler modifications that allow them to sneak on board the capital ship. This takes enough time for Rey to get decent training.
Back on the Resistance cruiser Dameron confronts hotto with a mutiny if she doesn't have some plan to save them, after she has repeatedly blocked his efforts to prepare to escape when the tracker is down.
She refuses, and Dameron relieves her of command.
He takes command on the bridge, readying himself for a signal from Finn.
As Finn, Rose and the hacker they found sneak through the enemy ship (without any building romance between Rose and Finn, as a different love interest each film is excessive for any character not named 'James Bond'), Chewie staying on the Falcon as tge prisoner ploy isn't going to work here (and he doesn't want to go through it again), they reach the tracking system only to discover First Order security they are unable to talk their way past, instead getting taken prisoner.
Back with Luke, we see Rey in the middle of force levitation meditation, when she receives a vision of Finn as a captive, with Kylo Ren standing over him (leaving it ambiguous which of them she has a connection with).
She prepares to leave, trying to figure out a way off the planet, but Luke stops her.
"You are not ready," he tells her, continuing before she can get angry at him, "but nor was I ready when a vision drove me to confront Vader the first time. The Force saw me through, and I must trust it will do the same for you."
He continues by telling her to use his X-wing, if she can lift it from the ocean, and he will locate the correct system through the Force.
When she arrives, she allows herself to be taken prisoner, to disrupt the vision by meeting Ren herself to try and turn him back to the light.
This sees her brought before Snoke as in canon.
As Ren escorts her, he tells her about her parents, that one was a clone from the clone wars (to establish her as having special heritage, without having the 'descended from one of the major bloodlines of the Force, so that clearly only these two special bloodlines can change the galaxy' subtext as in canon), before they enter the throne room and meet Snoke
Here Snoke boasts about turning Ren to the dark side, about the connection he forged between them to lure her here, and Rey realises the vision wasn't from her connection with Ren, but with Finn, and she made a mistake allowing herself be taken prisoner.
On the Resistance cruiser Leia awakens, and takes back control, at first blaming Dameron for the mutiny.
When she asks what reason he had to doubt their plan would work, however, he responds with an angry accusation that they didn't have a plan.
It is at this point that the formerly smug hotto finds herself the focus of Leias attention.
As Leia points out "the entire Resistance formed because people didn't trust that the New Republic had any kind of plan for the Imperial Remnants and First Order, and that in refusing to admit they had a plan hotto is responsible for all efforts taken by rogue elements to protect the Resistance, not to mention demonstrated why she didn't have the authority her seniority would suggest."
It is here that Leia explains the plan, to use the transport craft to ship everyone to the planet behind the cover of the cruiser, before a volunteer takes the cruiser to hyerspace to draw the First Order away and give them a chance to be rescued.
(This is one of the big problems with the concept in the film. The Empire had sent spy drones down, relying on the Rebels to dismiss them as meteor impacts. With the First Order being built from Imperial resources, they would know about this and know better than to dismiss such impacts as nothing.)
As they prepare to evacuate, we return to Finn and Rose, being held in the hangar bay.
They watch as the cruiser makes the jump, believing that the last chance for the Resistance leadership to survive has been lost, only for the ship not to follow.
Instead Phasma taunts them with the knowledge that "a traitor told them the plan, the ship is all but empty," and asserts that even turning against the Resistance doesn't stop the traitor being scum.
(At no point should Finn use the expression 'Rebel Scum' in reference to the Resistance, as for all the nostalgia about the term, it merely serves to legitimise the First Order. Having hotto as a traitor only makes sense given events in canon, but she could be turned into a loyal Resistance member by establishing the hyperspace jump into an enemy ship being an act that requires such precision that nobody would be willing to sacrifice a pilot capable of making the jump.)
Phasma declares that they will be able to watch the launch of the transports that will wipe out their friends on the surface, to demonstrate how badly they failed before they die.
And then explosions rock the ship, giving them a chance to fight back and escape, caused by Chewie with the Falcon.
There is a confrontation with Phasma where Finn ekes out a draw before being pulled away to a transport by Rose, who tells him that they need to warn the Resistance.
(Importantly, Phasma survives. Between them, Phasma and Ren act as separate aspects of Vader from the original trilogy. Ren takes the role of the powerful and potentially redeemable Force user, while Phasma is the disciplined and loyal warrior. By killing her early and in what basically amounts to an accident, it robs her of her impact on the films and Finn of the resolution of his story arc.)
In the throne room we see Snoke and Rey both insistent that Ren will be on their side, with Snoke distracted by something while Rey isn't as certain as she is in canon.
When Ren turns on the lightsaber to kill Snoke, there is a moments delay before Snoke responds, before they fight off the guards with each others weapons.
Rey tries to convince Ren to join the Resistance, to rebuild the Republic for the sake of the galaxy, but he refuses, telling her she should join him in the First Order, and bring peace to the galaxy through force.
When she refuses, they end up in a force tug of war over Annakins lightsaber, but before it can break Rey changes her mind, Pushing the inactive lightsaber into Ren, giving her a chance to grab it and escape.
Ren takes command, ordering an attack on the Resistance, but as he leaves the throne room the body of Snoke fades, revealing it as a projection all along.
(Killing off a mysterious figure like Snoke without giving anything about them is just one of many cases of episode VIII cutting plot threads as though it was the last entry in a franchise and was running low on time to deal with what had been set up previously.)
Rey escapes in the Falcon, but isn't able to head for the Resistance base due to Order pursuit.
On his planet Luke meets the force ghost of Yoda, and tells him that Rey isn't ready yet, that he should be there for her for even just a little longer, but Yoda tells him she has everything she needs.
In the base, things are hectic as they try to prepare a defence against the First Order for long enough that someone answers their distress call, preferably a fleet with Y-wings that can hope to take out the capital ship.
They discover the speeders stored in the base have degraded enough that they can only fly low enough to leave trails in the salt.
(The one strut design really doesn't make sense, but this way the trails of red on white can still happen.)
Here the First Order deploy a 'conventional' laser drill rather 'miniaturized Death Star tech', alongside conventional ground forces that drive the skimmers back without any means for a desperate sacrifice play (or intervention).
Back in the base, having bought only minutes, they are forced to confront that skimmers were only as effective due to their maneuverability, and that nobody is coming to rescue them.
It is here, as Ren descends in a command ship with Hux, that Luke appears, standing between Ren and the Resistance.
Hux protests everyone opening fire on Luke, but Ren orders the attack go ahead.
Luke is unaffected.
Inside the base Dameron realises Luke us acting as a distraction, to allow them to escape.
As they run through the depths of the base, Ren xones down to confront Luke, who, while he has it on his belt, doesn't draw his lightsaber.
While Ren attacks in a rage, tearing up the salt layer with each step, Luke merely dodges and attempts to talk Ren down, even as his steps fail to affect the salt.
(It really doesn't fit Lukes character to keep riling up the nephew he failed, rather than attempt to get through to him like Han.)
As Ren angrily demands that Luke draw his lightsaber and fight for real, Luke only responds that he never wanted to fight Ben, that he had no intention to see him dead. He also uses the improperly bled khyber crystal of Rens lightsaber, the reason for the vents in the hilt, as a demonstration that Ben isn't as lost as he claims to be.
In the caves the Resistance find the exit blocked by a cave in, only for Rey to appear outside and use the Force to clear the way.
Except she isn't able to lift all the rocks at once, creating a tense moment as she moves some of the rocks each time.
As they finally break through, with Finn and Rey sharing a hug, we cut back to the duel where Luke finally gives up on talking Ren down, and allows the lightsaber to connect.
Only to reveal himself as a projection.
He tells Ren that there is always a way back, before the projection turns blue and fades, demonstrating that Luke has become a Force Ghost like his father and masters.
Before Ren can respond to Lukes death, the Falcon launches, the insides so cramped with passengers that Rey makes it clear they need to land and find other ships as soon as possible.
For the final scene Finn tries to congratulate Rey, asking "if you're here, you must be a Jedi, right?"
She doesn't respond, but the camera pans to show the Jedi holocron on board.