Feeding on carbon doesn't make that much sense to me. The planet was still absolutely filled with the stuff, to the point where a mining colony was established to retrieve it despite the deadly radiation making it a massive undertaking. Imagine having to glide in the supplies, the effort it would take to build a habitable zone on that irradiated rock.

But if the creature was eating carbon and it was starved and rushed out the mineshaft, then why the elaborate toying? It would have devoured the people straight out. And there was no evidence of massive loss of mass on the dead bodies, because that probably would have been remarked on by the investigation team.

Makes more sense that this thing feeds on the fear and the paranoioa of it's victims. It delights in its own cruelty, we've seen that in Midnight and The Well. I'd call that a more likely reason for laughing as it came out. It has new toys and a possible chance to finally escape into the wider universe to keep feeding feed.

Some of these aren't even tropes...

But even if they all were, a trope does not ruin a movie simply by being present. They are neither good nor bad. It's how they're used, and a pinch of subjective interpretation.

I agree that it still holds up well today. I make a point of rewatching every year or two. Especially for Andreas Katsulas' acting.

The point in Acts of Sacrifice where he finally secures just the tiniest fraction of aid for his people and has a complete breakdown sobbing and laughing after leaving the room still gets me.

There're also the contemporary definitions of something that breaks established pattern, or when the narrative changes in unexpected ways.

That brings in a few more of the titles under the scope of 'off the rails'. But yeah, still doesn't quite cover the whole list even with the expanded definition.

Easily reconcilable. Thanks to Palpatine's progroms, nobody really knows much about the Jedi any more. All they know is they had freaky powers, and the Emperor defeated them. Anyone who knows better, tends to shut up because they don't need the attention.

Somebody suddenly realising their intense deja vu is actually future prediction or finding themselves able to move a credit chip with their mind only has one thing to contrast that with, if anything at all. The Jedi. So they'd think they're a Jedi.

And that would be the beginning point if Finn were that strongly Force Sensitive. He'd think he's a Jedi, and end up having to learn there is a lot more to actually being one than simply being a Force .

Also, you can just say "I'm a Jedi". Luke did it. He even claimed the title of Jedi Knight. He had maybe a year or two of intermittent strength training in a swamp, and didn't really learn what it was to be a Jedi until much, much later.