It's worth noting that Snoke merely looked unsettling in The Force Awakens mostly due to the deliberate Uncanny Valley effect that came as a result of his design. In The Last Jedi, however, he's haunting. Case in point, in this frame◊, where he's yelling at Hux, or in this frame◊, where he's giving off a creepy grin.
Snoke is shown unveiling one of his Force abilities: Using Mind over Matter on Rey, which was hinted at in an official guide to Star Wars (the telekinesis, that is) and looks quite painful, given her reaction. Then, there is what Snoke appears to be saying to Rey as he does this, his deep aspect returning from the last film.
The fact that the plot is literally the rebels being chased by the First Order. It's clearly established in The Force Awakens that The First Order is relentless; this film does not shy away from showing it. To name just one example; the rebels are tracked through light speed.
Hyperspace tracking as a whole is a nightmare to consider in the setting. The Original Trilogy established that jumping to hyperspace was a guaranteed way to escape pursuit. "Empire's" plot with Vader pursuing the Falcon was only possible because the Falcon's hyperdrive failed, and ended when R2 finally fixed the hyperdrive. Not so with the First Order. The First Order only needs to be within sight of an enemy ship when they jump to hyperspace to track through it to one out of billions of stars, then jump right on top of you. The First Order inherited the Empire's legacy and did the impossible, making true escape from the First Order almost impossible when they find you.note Of course, the Empire WAS working on it, but it never got off the ground due to the theft of the Death Star plans, Tarkin destroying the Scarif data vault along with most of the planet, and the events of the Original Trilogy, as well as the Aftermath Trilogy.
The film opens with the evacuation of D'Qar, but the Resistance is soon found out by a fleet of First Order Star Destroyers. This already puts a lot of pressure on the evacuating Resistance ships, but then out of hyperspace comes a thundering roar: the Fulminatrix, a Mandator-IVDreadnought, an even bigger threat dwarfing the Star Destroyers, heralded by multiple blaring sirens, readying its two immense orbital cannons at the Resistance's base. Poe is not kidding when he calls the ship a monster they've got to take down, lest the Resistance be annihilated.
A force of Resistance bombers attempts an attack on the dreadnought while being swarmed by TIE Fighters. A spectacular case of Disaster Dominoes wipes out most of the bombers in one fell swoop after a burning fighter crashes into the bomb bay of one of them. We get to see one of the bombers exploding from the POV of Paige, who is visibly taken aback by the sight of her comrades being wiped out with such sudden brutality.
The Fulminatrix itself exits hyperspace dangerously close to the camera, and it's terrifying to behold. It sports a dark grey color scheme with red effects and appears to be clad in spikes, bringing Shin Godzilla to mind.
When the First Order returns after the hyperspace jump, all the pilots go into the hangar and prepare to start their ships, complete with shots of Talli waving to friends. Then just as Poe arrives, the hangar gets destroyed, knocking him off his feet and back into the hallway. When he comes to, all he sees in the hangar is a vast, fiery hellscape that was home to some of his best friends just a few seconds ago. And then to add a bigger punch, the automatic door leading into the destroyed hangar closes like a curtain falling on a stage, a perfect way to sum up what just happened.
Snoke's ship, the Supremacy, showing up out of hyperspace. Death Stars not included, it is the largest starship ever seen in Star Wars (if the Mandator-IV Dreadnought the First Order just lost was still there, it would be dwarfed) and the dark shadow of its gigantic ominous shape comes with ominous sirens. Capable of tracking entire fleets through lightspeed, it's an Implacable Man with the shape of a starship the size of Rhode Island.
Snoke being his domineering self over Kylo Ren; he zaps him back with a casual burst of Force Lightning when the Dark Jedi nearly loses his temper with him.
Luke briefly contemplating killing Ben as he sleeps after sensing the uncontrollable surge of Dark Side in him. The green light on Luke's face from his lightsaber makes him look absolutely terrifying. It's equally frightening from Luke's POV — as he's shown being barraged with the screams and sounds of violence that are going on inside his nephew's head all the time, as it dawns on him what's truly happening at last — and from Ben's as despite his increasing power and instability he is obviously completely terrified of the only trusted adult in his life standing over him ready to butcher him.
The Mirror Cave where the Dark Side of the Force is strongest on Ahch-To. It's a fittingly dark, cold place, and the entire sequence of Rey falling into it is dripping with an eerie, unsettling atmosphere. In particular, the blowhole that acts as the sea cave's entrance is utterly unnerving to behold; a hole formed in an already perfectly sunken in circle of the coast, ringed by layers of pitch black seaweed. Nothing about it looks even remotely natural.
In-Universe, Rey discovering the location proves to be this for Luke. Teaching her about the balance of the Force, he is initially undisturbed by her finding it when probing the island with her mind. When it begins to draw her in however, he screams at her to pull back, fearing she may be drawn in too far to the Dark Side. He is left in terrified awe when she comes out of her vision, seemingly unaffected after diving into the Dark with no hesitation at all.
This is doubly disturbing when the Awful Truth about Rey's heritage is revealed in the next movie.
Canto Bight is initially presented as a Shining City and Finn is left awestruck, initially not understanding why Rose doesn't like the place. Then she shows why: not only is it a city of people profiting from selling weapons to both the Resistance and the First Order, its entertainment in particular runs off of enslaved, abused animals and children. In particular, Finn looks through a mounted telescope and sees fathers and young stable hands being administered electric shocks by a nasty Cloddogran groom. No wonder he quickly changes his mind about the whole place.
Finn escaped the First Order only to crash on Jakku, then escape with Rey to another fight, and another, and another, only to end up unconscious after Kylo Ren injures him on Starkiller Base. Then he wakes up on a starship fleeing the First Order and comes to Canto Bight. This is one of Finn's only experiences of beauty... and it's built on slavery and murder.
Poe and Holdo can't agree on how to best handle a desperate situation against the First Order where fighting back is suicide, and it ends up with Poe committing mutiny and having his closest allies hold Holdo and company at gunpoint. The Resistance, the last bit of hope in the galaxy, is nearly destroyed not just by the First Order, but also by internal conflict aboard the only major ship left.
Even if it was the desire to save his own life what motivated him, it's just chilling to see DJ just sell Finn, Rose, and basically the entire Resistance out to the First Order. Given his apparent lifestyle, one can't help but wonder if he's screwed over the lives of others in a similar fashion. His actions nearly finish off the Resistance for good and he just goes away with a ton of money.
Worse? His remorseful look and ambiguous words while doing his deed, ostensibly due to having sold out two people he had started to like, imply that DJ is not a cold, calculating psychopath or someone who enjoys screwing people up. Although he also gained a juicy profit with the betrayal, he probably acted out of self-preservation first and foremost. Which brings a new, disturbing quality to the moment: how many people, regardless of their morals and values, would have not acted the same way with a blaster pointed to the back of their heads? How many people, at both sides of the fourth wall, would have not found themselves betraying their friends and condemning the entire world in order to save their own lifes?
The First Order casually picking off the evacuating Resistance transports and ignoring the decoy Holdo set up with the cruiser. It's enough to bring her to the brink of tears as she desperately urges the evacuation to continue.
Vice-Admiral Holdo's Heroic Sacrifice, whilst utterly breathtaking to behold, is also a visually horrific showing of what happens when ships crash at lightspeed. The moment the Raddus impacts with the Supremacy, there's not a single identifiable trace left behind. And not only did it cleave the Supremacy, it also tore through the entire First Order fleet of Star Destroyers.
When Rey comes face-to-face with Snoke, she's completely helpless no matter what she tries. Snoke tosses her around the room and basically toys with her with minimal effort. He only dies due to some trickery on Kylo Ren's part, but straight-up, it seems clear that Snoke could wipe the floor with both of them if he wanted and hadn't made one miscalculation about Kylo's intentions.
Just the fact that Rey's innocent, understandable mistake (believing she could sway Kylo Ren back to the light) had horrific consequences. The last hope in the galaxy was almost destroyed because said last hope just so happened to be a naive but well-intentioned teenager who stumbled straight into a trap laid by The Chessmaster. When Snoke has her immobilized, Rey actually lets out a terrified squeak when she realizes how out of her depth she is. Just think about how out-of-character that is for her.
For that matter, the sight of Snoke's upper body toppling to the floor after Kylo bisects him is also quite disturbing. As is a blink-and-you'll-miss-it shot of one of Snoke's hands still sitting on the armrest of his chair.
Kylo Ren, having flirted with the possibility of returning to the Light Side the entire film, fully embraces the Dark Side and it is terrifying to behold. He's practically frothing at the mouth as he takes control, lashing out violently and even Force Choking Hux for mouthing off at him. He turns absolutely genocidal, and it's clear he's gone downright insane with rage and fear.
His temperaments are as volatile as they were in The Force Awakens. After a harsh berating by Snoke, Kylo seems to quietly mope about his Vader obsession. Sure enough, his melancholy swiftly turns to rage as he repeatedly slams his mask into the walls of the lift he's riding, and by the time he reaches his destination, it's a smoking mess. Kylo remains helmetless for the rest of the film.
The throne room brawl showcases just how intense, visceral, and violent light-saber combat can be. While there is mercifully little blood thanks to the way the blades cauterize the wounds as they are made, you see limbs and heads getting severed, faces impaled, and one hapless bodyguard is thrown into a machine which spits out his armor like confetti. It's best not to consider the state of his body...
Both Rey and Kylo have moments where they look, quite frankly, terrifying. At one point, Rey screams in a violent and guttural way, and at another Kylo snarls and looks around like a wild animal. Much like the climactic duel between the two of them in The Force Awakens, the scene more resembles the brutal, drag-out fanmade duels of the mid-2000s than it does the sweeping, elegant lightsaber clashes seen in the prequel trilogy.
Even though the film makes clear that the striking color is due to natural mineral deposits, there's something absolutely chilling about the Resistance's last stand after being run to ground with massive casualties taking place on Crait, whose pristine white salt surface becomes scarred by blood-red gashes. At the end, it looks like an ocean of blood.
Just as it appears that Luke is about to have a Big Damn Hero moment, the AT-AT fires. For the moment, it appears to have casually and anti-climatically reduced Luke to bloody chunks. It flirts with an R-rating.
If you look closely during the scene where Kylo Force Chokes Hux, the latter is coughing blood.
There's a rather nasty sound effect accompanying the choke, and unlike other Force Chokes we've seen Hux doesn't just clench his throat; his entire body seizes up. Together with Hux coughing up blood, it's clear that Kylo wasn't just strangling him, but flat-out crushing his windpipe.
Luke sends Kylo into a psychotic rage at his appearance, stopping the ground assault by the First Order in its tracks.
When Kylo Ren finally sees Luke Skywalker for the first time since his turn to the Dark Side, the look of rage absolutely boils over. He's literally screaming at his officers to keep firing everything at Luke's position.
At the beginning of the film, the Resistance consisted of a decently-sized fleet of starships. By the end, the entirety of it can fit in a small private ship. Sure, they're all just glad to be alive, but unlike the First Order, they don't even have any other air or land vehicles left in case the First Order decides to ambush them in the near-future or have an unfortunate malfunction or crash in the vastness of space.
Rey's behavior in this film shows just how precariously she's teetering on the edge between the Light and Dark Sides of the Force. We see her good intentions giving her more insight into Kylo Ren, but it also looks like it could become a dangerous attachment or even loyalty. She knowingly disobeys Luke and seeks out the Dark Side cave on Ahch-To, and after literally beating the truth out of Luke about the origin of Kylo, goes on a similar naive rescue mission to Luke in The Empire Strikes Back. During the encounter with Snoke, she ends up willingly summoning Kylo Ren's lightsaber to her when denied her own, and behaves in angry, primal ways in her fight against the Praetorian Guard, where she teams up with Kylo. The quote listed above about Luke not being scared enough back then (in Ren's case)...and he's talking about Rey now. Yoda had little faith in Luke, and was likely scared for him. Luke, however, is plainly scared of Rey, terrified she will become another Kylo Ren from his lessons, and it's really not hard to see why.
◊ revealing his Body Horror in all its glory.
