Perhaps it's subjective whether you enjoyed what the actress did. But the actual character arc was a blatant cheat with the writing and direction more or less lying to us to pull a bait and switch about her motives.
My response to that is, she's an Admiral. Read a space opera based on the military (I enjoy the Honor Harrington stuff). Admiral's can be wrong, or idiots, but they're not in the habit of tolerating being questioned by Commanders and Captains. Can you picture Poe acting like that to Ackbar? If your answer is no, then the rest of your response doesn't make sense. The gap between Admiral and Commander is very large.
It wasn't a cheat that she didn't explain herself. The cheat was that she didn't throw him in the brig.
Honestly, if Poe really got to the rank of Commander he'd have known better.
There was a reason they promoted Han and Lando to be Generals in Return of the Jedi. Meanwhile even with the resistance down to one ship Poe is demoted
because he has demonstrated a complete lack of strategic judgment - specifically the characteristic that an Admiral needs.
Remember this too, without Poe's support Finn and Rose's mission would not have occurred, and the Admiral's plan would have saved all 30 transports because the First Order needed to be told to find the cloaked ships. Against that back drop it was irresponsible to not put him in the Brig (or bring him in), but the blame for those deaths is on Poe.
In any action/hero film when a hero is established and 'knows what to do' we're supped to take it as a given that they do. If you watch some movie like that and begin to second-guess or question each action taken by the heroes then the film falls apart because in the end it's all fiction and it rarely makes 'real sense' anyhow. Everyday logic doesn't apply, even though in-universe rules are ideally consistent. Based on our 'film training' and also our understanding of the importance of the 'rebel spirit' Poe was portrayed from A to Z as The Guy Who Knows How to Kick Butt. Even when his bombing run is criticized the film seems to not let him go as a hero.
The point of this film is "growing up". Finn has to realized he does care enough to be a hero (which he does). Poe has to learn that strategy exists separate from tactics (which he shows by calling off the attack on the Ram, which Ironically Finn ignores to learn his lesson, but there's nothing in Poe's acting that shows him learning - other than his repeated failures (big hammer with Yoda telling you failure is the best teacher)). Rey has to learn that she doesn't need a master to tell her what to do, or missing parents to define her, that she has to trust herself, follow her feelings and do what she thinks is right.
Yes, they had to break the infalliable hero takes on the entire Empire meme to learn that lesson. And perhaps to teach the audiance? No. The infallable heroes will be back for the next film.
Finn struggles with whether he's seen as a hero or not, but not Poe: he's a hero, no questions asked, like a mix between Han Solo and Wedge. That's the character bible and it never ceased being that. Even when Leia said he's wrong somehow we knew he wasn't on some level, and later on he takes on a leadership role without question, despite a demotion.
Because he is a leader. But so is every officer (granted some better some worse). Big difference between a leader and a general (or in this case Admiral).
When Dern is portrayed having no clue what to do as fuel runs out, and cannot answer even simple questions about whether they have a plan, the script writing is indicating in every way that she's clueless and is going to let the fleet die rather than take a chance.
Maybe this is the distinction then, why I thought she did such a good job. I didn't fall for that. She's an admiral, she had a plan, and it was a good one. Poe second guessing an Admiral that I thought he knew the reputation of (and wasn't it for heroism?) because he "knows better" is exactly why he was a danger. C3P0 had it right when he didn't want to be part of a mutiny.
Only due to a writer's deus ex machina did she magically have a plan after all, and refuse to tell anyone, using a tech we didn't know existed, and didn't even claim to have a plan, or look like she knew what she was doing, all so that Poe could magically be shown to be utterly in error and a traitor (in effect). Great.
I get the anger there. Once the plan's in motion, maybe even before, there's not really a need for secrecy. That's a plot hole. But so are a dozen other things that existed solely to put people onto Snope's ship.
Nothing in the actress's performance showed any of this, or the wily cunning to know she was holding a secret, or the wisdom to know she had to keep her cards to herself, or even a reason for doing so. Nada, zip.
Again, maybe it's because I was looking for her to portray an Admiral, and that's exactly what I saw. If anything she was too tolerant of his antics, but she even portrayed that with her smiles for the romance of being a hot shot bad boy pilot. I seem to be alone on this based on the internet.
Maybe it'll look different when I see the movie again.
This was no case of us making unwarranted assumptions and having those assumptions shoved in our faces. We made totally warranted assumptions and had them shoved in our faces. This is the same schtick they pulled on LOST over and over, pulling the rug out from under us just because they had the Bugs Bunny power of the paint brush. Thanks for nothing.
I'm not sure what "warranted assumptions" were made? That a commander was in charge over the Admirals, Generals and Civilian leaders in the group? Heck, even a ship's captain going to outrank Poe. I get the confusion started with Luke, and his outsized role based on rank (who's Poe's model for character - even though he can outfly Luke and every other rebel pilot). But while Luke's out sized authority based on his rank could be attached to being a literal hero of the Rebellion (just like Poe) he was also carrying a light saber and developing force powers, which likely had more to do with it. Honestly, Poe got way more lee way than his rank deserved, he disobeyed the commands of the fleet leadership and got a bunch of people killed (granted he achieved his target) and only got demoted.
