After seeing each Star Wars film, I feel I need to watch the Half in the Bag/Plinkett reviews (which are absurdly long bee tee dubs). H/t to my buddy Tate for turning me on to them. Those guys are generally right on, though I usually only seek them out for Star Wars. I just want to get my own thoughts down first. Here goes.
Quick note. I am (or can be) a critic. Certain movies or franchises are held to a higher standard and Star Wars is up there. I try to be level-headed but sometimes I'm not.
Definitely spoilers ahead.
I saw Rise of Skywalker a few nights ago. Admittedly I was predisposed to dislike it after hating The Last Jedi and failing to see how they could make it all work. Coming out of the theater, my mind was unchanged. The one time I laughed was Rey force pushing Finn away when he wanted to 'help' during a lightsaber fight. Come on, you can't help her. I was also immediately irritated with the final scene but have softened on it. Rey taking the name Skywalker completes an arc about her belonging and Luke/Leia being her mentors.
Everyone I've talked to since agrees that JJ Abrams needed to undo TLJ, a movie critics loved and everyone who liked Star Wars hated. It's got to be difficult to do this. My biggest frustration with the new main line SW films going in was that there was no overall vision. The Force Awakens was certainly derivative, but it also asked a number of interesting questions (Who was Rey? Who was Snoke? Where is Luke?). The Last Jedi was certainly an original story but it just threw these questions out the window. Simply surprising the audience does not make a good movie. Abrams then crammed so much into IX that he could've completed the trilogy himself just with material from his two.
After doing some thinking I came up with what I liked, because it was easy to rattle off the things I didn't and I want to try and be fair. I liked that it was again an original story. The hunt for the Sith planet is a cool enough idea and the search for clues along the way was fun. There weren't whole side plots just to give the characters something to do, as at least they were with Rey for much of it. In a continuation, any part involving Rey and Kylo's relationship, and when they cross paths with Luke, was stellar. I liked their force conversations and face-offs. Rey being confronted with her own power, demons, and lineage finally explained and showed her character in full. It legitimately surprised me that Han made an appearance, and it brought out a smile in an important moment. Leia was well used and didn't look wholly fake, which considering Carrie Fisher died three years ago(!) was impressive. I appreciate the thought that went into the Emperor's final demise, and that it was his own power that did him in.
Am I convincing myself that I liked the movie as I write this? Maybe...
No. I disliked a lot and was distracted throughout. Many of the decisions Abrams made felt lazy. While the acting was very good (Adam Driver!), the dialogue and plot at times lacked polish or outright made no sense. And there was just too much going on. Some of the bothersome stuff can be explained by the changing directors and lack of vision, but not all. Rapid fire: Did we really need another example that Poe is an awesome pilot? The lightspeed jumping stuff was unnecessary and doesn't seem to jive with what we know about hyperspace travel. (All probably a direct result of the 'Holdo manuever,' which, same thing.) A giant fleet of star destroyers didn't particularly scare me since they appeared to be unmanned. Apparently simply talking about staffing them made it so. Kylo being the leader of the 'Knights of Ren' was a cool title that we heard in The Force Awakens, but that doesn't mean we needed to meet them, especially if they're entirely unintimidating. They were just a bunch of guys standing on a rock in a circle, who then couldn't find the rebels, or do anything of note. I was basically just annoyed by Finn. He never told Rey what he meant to (apparently that's he's force-sensitive? all he ever knows is that Rey is in danger, isn't that obvious?). He was brave in the big battle, so I guess there's that. When they see the Death Star (which one?) and someone asks what it is, Rey says it's 'a bad place.' Top notch writing. The big moment of help arriving in the final battle is painfully obvious and unearned. We met one person earlier in the film who shows up, and I don't think there was anybody else. It's such a weird battle where we don't really see anyone in the Final Order ships or those late arrivals. All of a sudden Palpatine's lightning abilities are orders of magnitude stronger. Previously seen incapacitating individual people, now he can take down a whole fleet. Speaking of whole fleets, Abrams gave every one of the Final Order ships planet killing abilities. Laaaaaazy. Then lastly, using Palpatine again. There clearly aren't enough characters to draw from.
So the movie is a bit of a mess, and the trilogy is a mess when you take a step back.
Really though, all of it is forgivable. We're talking popcorn flicks at the end of the day.
One thing isn't forgivable, and it's slowly been bugging me more as this trilogy has developed. Bringing Palpatine back definitely cemented it. For all the issues with the prequels, they built to the original films and improved them. The so-called Machete order is brilliant (IV, V, II, III, VI) as it maintains both big reveals. Effectively it uses the prequels as a flashback between Empire and Return of the Jedi. The new trilogy does the opposite. It removes the victory gained in the original trilogy, including Vader's ultimate turn, and this is especially evident with the knowledge the Emperor survived and was the puppet-master to the end. It's a massive failure that these new movies make me like the original movies less. That's my biggest takeaway. I don't have any interest in watching the new trilogy again and my overall interest in Star Wars has totally crashed.
Any-hoo. Here's Half in the Bag.
(They're much more harsh than I am. And it's great.)
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