We have now come to the end of this new Star Wars trilogy. I have taken some time to let it sit with me before I wrote about it. I had some very strong feelings afterwards and after a few days, I still have them. What you are about to read is a severe nitpicking of some of the elements of this movie. I only do that when I have turned on a movie. Although I did not find this movie objectively bad (re: The Last Jedi), I still have problems with it.
I will warn you before you go further. There will be a lot of spoilers here. I can't make my main complaints/compliments without mentioning specific moments in the film. There, that's your warning. After this point, it is on YOU.
I will be up front and say I thought it was okay. I did not love it (Force Awakens) or hate it (Last Jedi), so this falls in between.
While I like J.J. Abrams, I think he and Disney tried to do two things with this film. Right the wrongs of Last Jedi and also double down on the nostalgia and history of the Star Wars franchise. I think both of those were at the detriment of this film. This movie works so hard to do both that this movie comes off feeling like a retread.
It is almost as if they are ticking off check boxes, to make sure the fans are happy after the backlash of the last movie. Let's be honest. Trying to cater to extreme Star Wars fans is the wrong direction to go in. To keep it simple, I will call out nostalgia plot points in the rest of this review. Once you see how many added up, you'll see what I mean.
At the end of the day, this is a movie that was just afraid to take chances. First of all, after all that was set up, you're going to tell me that Emperor Palpatine (Nostalgia) was the big bad all along?! We spend all this time setting up new characters and the First Order and this is who is behind it all? Well doesn't that just negate Vader's actions at the end of the Return of the Jedi? As cool as it might be that he's back, I wanted the new characters to fight a new threat that is supposed to be worse than the previous one. If you are going to bring people back, why can't we ever get Darth Maul? This highlights the fact that we don't have a real good villain in these movies. Snoke was unceremoniously killed off in the last movie, so this is what we're left with. Can I also add that we didn't need to see the remains of the Death Star (Nostalgia) playing a huge part here?
Speaking of villains, let's just get to Kylo Ren. They have teetered back and forth on whether he is bad or not. When he killed Han Solo, I praised them for having the stones to kill off a beloved character to complete his heel turn (to steal some wrestling lingo). Kylo got over as a heel, but then they have him being more emo and whiny in Last Jedi, as he pines after Rey. The whole time they kept teasing an arc of redemption with him and I was really hoping they wouldn't. Well, they did. Despite all that he's done and all the people he killed, he ultimately redeems himself in the end and sacrifices himself. If he had lived, I would have had a real problem with him turning face and helping out the rebellion. Trying to live up to the legacy of his grandfather made him more compelling, since he clearly had daddy issues. Also, I do NOT like how he and Rey resolve their issues at the end of the film.
While on the topic of villains, I did not like Rey's parentage revelation either. We all wanted her to be the daughter of Luke, but that was not meant to be. Instead, she IS a big deal after all. After the reveal (I won't say here but it is Nostalgia), it only left me with more questions. Here it was as if they wanted to go away from what everyone wanted and instead decided to go with a swerve that really makes no sense. For once, going with the fan opinion would have been the best option. I guess this was in service to how she was treated in Last Jedi and they wanted to make all that make sense. As if she couldn't decide who she wants to be on her own. I hate the idea of a predetermined fate and that is what they try to get across with Rey.
I'm almost done with my gripes and then we will get to what I did like about the film. There is a point in the film where they appear to kill two main legacy (re: Nostalgia) characters. Again, I won't reveal because I want to hold some things back. For me, if they actually had the stones to go through with it, it would have been a big deal. Instead, it is quickly reversed, so the emotional roller coaster they put you on is a fake out. Take some chances, movie!
This is all spilling out of me now. Star Wars is now having a real problem with locales. In every Star Wars movie now, we get these in no particular order: Sand Planet, Forest/Jungle planet, Planet with Ice on it, Dreary Planet. In playing on Nostalgia, we gotta make sure people recognize these traditional settings or they might get confused. As much as I hated that casino scene in Last Jedi, at least it was somewhere we haven't seen yet. Also, lets make sure we see Ewoks (Nostalgia) because they are still around.
Finally, a couple of shorter gripes and then I promise I am done. I do have some positive things to say, I promise. The McGuffin in this movie is some ancient artifact that will help our characters find the secret Empire army on some unknown planet. So once again, some characters band together for a secret mission that they hope will win the war? Where have we seen this before? Perhaps every Star Wars movie ever? (Nostalgia). Just once I would love to see the Rebellion win in a tactical battle without tricksn Anyway, I bring this up because to get there, they have to extract info out of C3PO's head and that comes at a price. I should mention that they don't really give C3PO a choice. As a character in these movies, he's earned that option. Anyways, they do so, only to find out that there is another one in the hands of Kylo Ren that they happen upon anyway. So it was all for naught. It's problematic because they spend a lot of the movie looking for this item.
Finally, I don't know if it is in response to all the negative backlash from the last movie, but the biggest casualty of this movie is the character of Rose Trico. She was a new character in Last Jedi and her inclusion sparked some controversy that even lead to the actress (Kelly Marie Tran) getting off social media after being constantly bullied. So the studio's answer to that? Let's limit her to a few scenes and call it a day. There are new characters that pop up in this film alone that have more screen time than her. Also, she had maybe a romance with Finn and that is quickly swept under the rug and forgotten. Like her or not, but her exclusion speaks volumes. Especially in light of the fact that we even got a few more new characters to try and keep track of.
So I have spent a lot of time detailing what I don't like. Let's try and end on some positives. One of my biggest problems with the last movie is that our cast of characters barely spent any time together. They are supposed to be our new group and this movie thankfully addresses that. They are not split up as much this time and move together as a group. I loved that.
Also, another wrong that was righted was having Billy Dee Williams return as Lando Calrissian (Nostalgia). Better late than never, Disney! It was good to see him again and he played a part in the movie. Wish would could have seen him interact with Han, Luke or Leia, but it wasn't meant to be. At least we saw him with Chewy and C3PO and that was great.
The one thing these movies have going for them is that there is a lot of action. I do like the light saber battles that they have put together and the choreography is pretty good. I will say that sometimes there is too much action without a lot of time to breathe.
I said it before and I will say it again. I am an absolute sucker for the Millenium Falcon. So every time it shows up, it makes me happy. Seems everyone in the world flies it, so who actually OWNS it now!? Anyways, glad to see it show up again and play a big part.
Although I griped about all the nostalgia here, this movie does serve as a nice bookend to all nine movies. So it at least felt like we wrapped things up here.
Finally, I want to say that we did get a nice send off for Princess Leia here and it was touching to see her in some of the scenes. The actors all did a great job and I still really like Daisy Ridley as Rey. Oscar Issacs as Poe, John Boyega as Finn all have great chemistry with one another and it was good to see them act off each other more.
With all the complaining I did, I would give this movie a 2.5 out of 5 stars, if I was to rate such things. The nostalgia (even though I railed against it), affected me enough that it earned an extra half star.
Ultimately, these movies feel like a missed opportunity. It never felt like they had a real idea of where they wanted this story to go. They were making it up as they went and it definitely feels like that. Using this movie to correct Last Jedi, which undid some of Force Awakens hurts the overall trilogy. We know they will make more. Let's hope they get one unified voice next time and have them shepherd that thing all the way to the end and fit those pieces together so it all makes sense.
If you've seen the other movies, you owe it to yourself to see this one too. That is about as high a praise as you will get from me.
