5.5/10 Normally I keep my film reviews short and sweet but with this most recent Star Wars trilogy, I decided to give the fans what they wanted and make each review epic and long, going point by point as to what worked and what didn’t in each, respective movie. As you can tell from the score I gave this movie, it ends up being pretty mediocre/average. Allow me to go chronologically through the film as I nitpick every gritty detail and then summarize my overall feelings on the movie at the end. Unlike all my other reviews, this review contains massive spoilers so turn back now if you haven’t yet seen the movie…
-“Guess who’s back back back back again gain gain…”: Right from the opening crawl we discover that Palpatine is back and has essentially announced it, as his voice has been heard and rumors of his return have spread across the galaxy. It makes no sense that he would announce his return or allow his presence to be known, seeing as how he is ruining an element of surprise which he has held for decades and in which keeping quiet would be a huge advantage for him.
-This is the Way: If you were Palpatine and wanted to stay on the down low so no one could come interrupt your empire growing/star fleet building, why on Earth would you make two way finders to let anyone discover your location in the first place? This is similarly as stupid as when Luke Skywalker wanted to be left alone in solitude, so he stuck a map of how to get to him into R2D2 in “The Force Awakens”. It provides a way for our characters to get to Palpatine but makes absolutely no logical sense.
-Attack of the Clones: When we first come across this hidden Sith planet, Exegol, we see how Palpatine has been cloning Snoke and experimenting in cloning to assumedly build up his army. This raises more questions that never get addressed. How long does it take to clone someone? If he created Snoke, who was super powerful (until he wasn’t), why not create an army of Snokes or other Sith like creatures who are as powerful as Snoke? Can anyone be cloned/created? J.J. Abrams opens up a can of worms here as a minor footnote that has troubling consequences.
-Palpateenaged Wasteland: Palpatine admits that he has died before (at the end of “Return of the Jedi”) which makes the fact that he is inexplicably back pretty ridiculous. We are given no concrete reason as to how after dying, he was able to come back to life, get to Exegol and be accompanied by or create some worker bees to help him build the Final Order.
-On his Reydar: Palpatine instructs Kylo Ren to kill Rey. Normally this would be fine but considering later in the movie, Palpatine says how he never wanted Rey to be killed (if he did he could have offed her as a child) so then why does he tell Kylo Ren to kill her? What if Kylo would have been successful and actually killed her, ruining Palpatine’s plans?
-Let’s get Ready to Rubble: All of the star fighter ships that Palpatine and his Sith army have built were built underground, beneath rocks/stones. First off, why?! Since no one knew where this planet was, he could have constructed them out in the open and no one would have been the wiser. Also, how does coming up through hard stone/ground/rocks not damage all of these ships? Did he plan on them being damaged and leave time for repairs? The whole idea just seems completely ill advised and reckless and only done for visual purposes.
-Bored games: Abrams is too much of a sucker for nostalgia and although he doesn’t force as much into this movie as he did into “The Force Awakens”, we get our first unnecessary glimpse of some when we see Chewy, Finn and Poe playing their hologram board game, which we already got a glimpse of in “The Force Awakens”. This just acts as a call back to the original trilogy but since we already saw this two movies ago, it just seems like Abrams had eaten some “memberberries” and had to get that across to the audience.
-Let’s get Practical, Practical: One element of this movie that I really enjoyed was how practical effects were utilized. The vast majority, if not almost all of the creatures in this movie are practical effects, people in suits, real makeup, etc. There is plenty of room for CGI, but to put practical effects into the movie ensured that the look of this movie will age well and it was something I greatly appreciated and wish more blockbuster film makers utilized.
-Speed 3: Lost Control: In the Millennium Falcon we see our heroes “hyper speed jumping/lightspeed skipping”. After “The Last Jedi” obsessed over fuel usage and preservation, it seemed like a waste of fuel and since the pursuing enemies were able to hyper speed jump as well, totally pointless. This is only shown to look cool, but was totally unnecessary. Furthermore, while hyper speed jumping/lightspeed skipping through all of outer space, they just so happen to land on planets every single time. With how vast and open space is, for them to just so happen to land on planets every single time is insane. The chances of that happening are astronomical but Abrams prioritized some planets looking cool and set pieces over logic and reason.
-How and Wow: Finn asks Poe how he knows how to hyper speed jump/lightspeed skip and since there is no reason Poe would know how since he never has used this move before, he just doesn’t answer Finn and expects us to forget about that valid question. This is the first of a few times that a character asks a valid question to another character and we just flat out don’t get an answer because the screenwriters were too lazy to answer their own questions.
-LevitateterTot: We see Rey levitating early on in the movie, which she now has the skills to do as she has gotten stronger with the Force. This is not a complaint by any means, but is to be noted for a couple of scenes that come about later…
-Training Rey: As we see Rey doing her training course, which brings sense to her growing in her Force powers, one does have to wonder why she even needs to train since she is so good at everything she does. Her being a “Mary Sue” has continued throughout the entire trilogy and we all know that even without training, she would still be an expert at everything. This makes her character less interesting and makes the training course more for show.
-Score One for Williams: I will comment more on the score at the end of the review but some of the score’s best moments come early on in the film on Exegol and during Rey running her training course. There are definitely some musical moments that let us know that John Williams has still got it.
-ArgueD2: Another element of this movie that really works in a couple scenes involves some of our lead protagonists infighting and arguments. Rey and Poe argue over the Falcon being damaged and BB8 getting scraped up, in addition to Rey not joining them on the mission. Since we have seen these characters all buddy-buddy and getting along so well throughout this trilogy, to see some turmoil between them and everything not being ok was actually really interesting and engaging. We get a little more of it later on and I wish they would have played up these elements and moments even more than they did.
-Weird Science: Dominic Monaghan’s character, Beaumont, when talking about Palpatine’s return and all that is going on with the Sith says something along the lines of, “Dark science, cloning. Secrets only the Sith knew.” Well if only the Sith knew them then how did Beaumont know that dark science and cloning were going on? This is another example of chalking up inexplicable things to “dark science” so the real answer doesn’t have to be explained.
-Fix It Felix: At multiple times in this movie (and throughout the trilogy) the Millennium Falcon gets damaged yet no matter where they end up, where they crash land or how bad the damage is, they somehow ALWAYS have the spare parts and raw materials to fix any damage, no matter how insignificant or colossal, that the ship encounters. It begins to become rather unbelievable that someone has a Mary Poppins bag full of tools and supplies to always pull spare parts from.
-Rose’s Thorny Reception: Rose was such a terrible character in “The Last Jedi” so while her presence was not missed in this movie, they could have given her a better excuse than having her studying specs on old destroyers as a way to keep her from joining our main crew. I just didn’t buy that someone else couldn’t have done that job (it is not like that was ever her job). So although I am happy she isn’t around to annoy us, the screenwriters could have given her one redeeming moment or something worthwhile to do.
-I Spy: When Kylo Ren goes to essentially a board room meeting, he tells General Hux that he senses his unease about his mask. So Kylo Ren can read minds (Jedi and Sith have been known to do so) to the minor detail of how someone feels about his wardrobe choices but can’t read minds to figure out who the spy/traitor is amongst their ranks. Kylo or Palpatine should have easily been able to figure out who the spy is with some simple mind reading, but that would have made too much sense, apparently.
-Overreact Acting: While in that same board room meeting, some no name guy asks a simple question to Kylo Ren. He asks what Palpatine wants in return for receiving his fleet, which is a valid, normal question. Kylo responds by choking him and slamming him up to the ceiling. While Kylo has been shown to act rash and is prone to violent outbursts, there was absolutely nothing wrong or disrespectful about the man’s question that warranted that level of response. Another moment we can chalk up to looking cool but not making sense. They could have had the man contradict Kylo or ask a foolish question which would have warranted the response but the way the moment stands in the movie just seems like overkill.
-Order of Operations: The first couple times I saw this movie and our heroes get to the desert planet where they stumble upon Lando Calrissian, I was baffled at the presence of a Storm Trooper who spots our heroes. What was a random Storm Trooper doing there? Upon my third and final (thank God) viewing I heard a quick throwaway line that I hadn’t noticed before to justify his presence, “First Order patrols in crowds like these.” Although that explains him being there, it doesn’t answer the question of why. Why would the First Order have one or two random Storm Troopers during a celebration to patrol? Wouldn’t those men be better used elsewhere? It makes no sense but only exists so our characters can get into some danger and Lando can make an entrance.
-The Return of the Force Skype: Even though we had never seen these “Force Skyping” abilities prior to this trilogy, I can accept that two Force sensitive individuals can see each other and communicate from a distance. Then this movie goes and changes it up again by having their actions impact the environment of the other person. Suddenly they can fight and break objects across plains. Rey’s necklace is able to be grabbed and taken (essentially teleported) to a faraway location. Force powers continue to get made up and/or expanded as we make our way through these movies.
-By Lando, Sea or Air: There are a few problems with Lando’s entrance into the movie. First off, we get the Lando ex machina where he just so happens to show up in the exact place and the exact moment where our protagonists are in danger, facing a Storm Trooper from the First Order. The timing is super unrealistic. Also, Lando explains how him and Luke were there to try and find the way finder. Upon not finding it, Luke retreated to his solitude to be left alone. Why did Lando stay there? He was an outsider, this wasn’t his home and he was only there to locate something. Since he didn’t find it and Luke left, I don’t believe he would have stuck around. Yet the movie has him stick around for decades just so he can be reunited with Chewy and our protagonists.
-Fly Boys: I remember pointing out in my review of “The Force Awakens” how Finn would repeat the same lines multiple times and how annoying that became. Although very minor and more of an annoyance than a flaw, we have three different characters repeat the same line when noting how Storm Troopers can now fly (although apparently only certain ones at certain times, which is very inconsistent). The line “They fly now” is said three times in a row and it just felt cheesy to me.
-Call Me By Your Aim: Storm Troopers are known for being useless and having terrible aim. During the flying/chase scene a specific Storm Trooper misses every shot and then shoots two perfectly aimed shots that are enough to knock all of our heroes off of their vehicles but not enough to kill them. Normally in real life when someone shoots they either have good aim, average aim or bad aim. But you don’t see someone who can’t hit the broad side of a barn suddenly get to precision snipes. I just didn’t buy it. Following that, once a couple of the Storm Troopers’ jet packs get hit and they are flying uncontrollably around before they crash, they make a gigantic explosion once they hit the ground. Unless those Storm Troopers were storing tons of C4 up their asses, there is no way their jet packs exploding should have the same sized explosion as a building being demolished.
-Lend A Helping Sand: Remember when in the beginning of the movie how Rey levitates and how I brought that up? Well here is the first instance where she doesn’t use levitation. While sinking into quick sand, you would think that then would be a good time to levitate up from the ground. Hell, you could even float on over to your friends, grab their hands and pull them up too. But does Rey use the skills she has acquired in her training for a practical, lifesaving use? Nope, she sinks like my motivation to rewatch this trilogy for some apparent reason.
-A Quickie Sand Question: As our heroes are sinking into the sand, Finn yells to Rey in desperation how he needs to tell her something. Before he can say what though, they have been pulled down into the sand. Once they survive the ordeal and are underground, Rey questions Finn as to what he was going to tell her. Poe wants to know as well and Finn comments how he will tell her later when Poe is not around. Flash forward to later in the movie when our heroes are captured and about to be put to death and Poe asks Finn again because he wants to know before they die. So this is brought up multiple times throughout the movie and we never get an answer as to what Finn wanted to tell Rey. Why even include this into the movie if you weren’t going to follow through and finish it? This blatantly breaks the “Chekhov’s Gun” rule and left the audience feeling empty.
-Glass Half Empty: At one point Leia and Rose basically scold a man (played by J.J. Abrams regular Greg Grunberg) for not being more positive when delivering bad news. They demean his pessimism and tell him to be more optimistic. I think the bit was played for laughs except it wasn’t at all funny and frankly made them look like jerks since he was just being realistic about their situation.
-Dem Bones, Dem Bones, Dem Dry Bones: Can anyone tell me what the chances are of our heroes happen to having had their vehicles destroyed and fly through the air to land specifically into non-lethal quicksand that drops them at exactly the spot where the dagger that they need to find is? Furthermore, the dagger is buried under sand and bones and our heroes just so happen to reach down and pull out the dagger in that exact spot. This is eye rollingly convenient that they happen to find it buried there. Going back to why in the world would Palpatine create way finders to lead to him, why would a dagger, which is a map to one of the way finders be made in the first place? The movie tries to make the audience focus on which clue to follow next instead of why these clues even exist in the first place.
-C3PNO: C3PO reads the Sith language on the dagger which has the location of the way finder but due to his programming, cannot translate the Sith language. First of all, a young Anakin Skywalker programmed him and I find it rather unbelievable that at his very young age, he would have programmed C3PO to not recite aloud anything in the Sith language. But even if we go with that, I can’t believe there aren’t loopholes that C3PO could have used to help our heroes out without having to actually read the inscription aloud. For example, why can’t C3PO just say, “Hey guys, I know where to go. Let’s hop on the Falcon and I can input our coordinates and you guys can fly us all there.”? There are definite loopholes that could have been used (writing the location down in a non Sith language perhaps?) to help our heroes out but the movie just wants more obstacles for our heroes to overcome, despite not being logical.
-Snake Oil, Oil, Toil and Trouble: While underground our heroes come across a random serpent creature. Instead of killing it instantly, which would have made sense, Rey has to hesitate so we can see that it is injured. How it got injured? We have no idea. Why does the serpent even let Rey get close enough and then touch it? If you came across an injured lion or bear or snake, any dangerous predator really and tried to touch it, it would probably attack you. A creature being injured probably puts it on even higher alert because that creature knows how vulnerable it is. Yet without knowing Rey’s intentions, this creature lets her touch him.
-What’s the Big Heal?: Speaking of the serpent, Rey has never healed anything before. How does she even know she can touch wounds to heal them? In fact, Force healing has never been a Force power in the Star Wars franchise so why does what the Force can do continuously change time and time again? If Jedi and Sith can heal, why hasn’t healing been used to heal and/or prevent death in all of the previous films when necessary? Since Rey is a Mary Sue who has no experience in healing, of course she can perfectly do it on her first try.
-A Tall Tail: Since our heroes are still trapped underground, of course the serpent conveniently has its tail smack the ceiling, creating the roof to collapse and a hole for our heroes to escape. What a stroke of luck!
-Goodknight: Like Captain Phasma or Snoke before them, the Knights of Ren have proven to be completely useless. What could have been a badass group of fighters with a unique backstory instead turns into faceless, personality free soldiers with no backstory and no character development who serve no purpose to the plot, don’t accomplish anything and whose absence wouldn’t change the movie or trilogy in any meaningful way. What a waste.
-Holy Ship: Another huge convenience is how our heroes just so happen to find a perfectly functioning and abandoned ship to scavenge for parts from in the desert. This partly goes back to the complaint about spare parts always being available but what makes this scenario even more laughable is that this abandoned ship would have definitely already been scavenged for spare parts, taken or destroyed by now. Good thing our heroes just have free and functioning ships fall into their laps. Apparently this ship has been sitting there for over 30 years yet is able to turn on and work completely fine because the script says so.
-Kylo Fren or Foe: There are definitely contradicting moments with Kylo Ren coming to kill Rey and if he actually wants to kill her or not. He is ordered to by Palpatine so we can assume Kylo is coming to kill Rey since he is seen speeding towards her in his ship. So if he is coming to kill her as he rams his ship towards her, why doesn’t he fire his laser weapons at her while barreling towards her? Surely she wouldn’t be able to overcome a barrage of lasers and avoid getting run over. But then if Kylo didn’t fire the lasers because he didn’t mean to kill her then why try to run her over? Either way, it just doesn’t make sense.
-Don’t Face the Threat: Another moment of something happening in the movie that is in no way practical but made J.J. Abrams say, “…but this will look super cool, guys!” is when Kylo tries to run Rey over. She turns her back to the oncoming ship, starts running and then times her jump perfectly to avoid getting splattered as she cuts his ship up with her lightsaber. As cool as it does look, it would have been much smarter to face the oncoming ship and jump when appropriate instead of facing away where you can’t see how close it is to you and have a harder time judging the timing of when to jump.
-Not Very Crash Money of You: Once Rey slices up Kylo’s ship, which is moving very fast, we see his ship hit the ground hard and roll along until it crashes into some rocks. Why it doesn’t explode when a simple Storm Trooper made a huge explosion with less of a crash is beyond me. Furthermore, when he exits the downed vehicle, he doesn’t have a scratch on him, no concussion and is able to walk fine as if nothing happened. This is the first but not the last time we will see something that should have killed Kylo result in nothing physically damaging happening to him.
-Chew(bacca) on That: One moment that I initially thought was super ballsy and brave of the film makers to do was to kill off Chewbacca. We would have really seen some internal turmoil if Rey would have been responsible for the accidental killing of such a beloved character. Instead, we are told that Chewy got onto another ship, not the one that Rey brought down and destroyed. Yet every time I viewed this movie, I looked for some second ship that Chewy would have gotten onto and we never see it. If they wanted to throw a twist at us and save Chewy, they should have established multiple ships so it would have made sense that Chewy could have hopped onto a different one. Instead, we are supposed to believe that some phantom ship existed that Chewy magically got onto, despite it never having been there.
-Time to Go: After what we think is Chewy’s death, Poe and Finn are yelling for Rey to hurry up and get onto the ship so they can escape. If you pay close attention to the timing of how close the enemy ships are to them and how far Rey is from the ship that she needs to get to, you will realize that there is no way she would have made it back in time for all of them to escape. More realistically, the enemy ships would have blasted their ship before they even took off while waiting for Rey to climb aboard. The movie cheats with the timing but since everything happens so fast, the audience isn’t supposed to notice things like that.
-The Report: Back on the bad guy’s main ship, Richard E. Grant’s character, General Pryde, is informed of what happened on the desert planet and how our heroes got away. He snaps back in anger that he already knew that by saying, “I’ve seen the report!”. Then he is informed that they have taken Chewy as a POW, something he didn’t know and is a bit of good news for him. So what doesn’t make sense to me is that this report as to what happened on the mission would have definitely included the fact that they took a valuable POW so this shouldn’t have been any new news to General Pryde. Its absence from the report makes no sense.
-A Disconnect: One thing I will touch on in my summary of this movie is just how disconnected each movie in this trilogy is from the other. There are obvious reasons for that but while watching this movie I couldn’t help but notice how the plot of this movie has absolutely nothing to do with the plot of either of the first two movies in the trilogy. A trilogy is supposed to be one epic story that takes three movies to tell but here there is no connecting tissue to the other movies besides sharing some of the same characters. But more on that later…
-D-O D-O Turd: We are introduced to a new, smaller droid called D-O in this movie, which was voiced by director J.J. Abrams. The character is rather pointless and only there when convenient to the plot. Why does BB8 turn him on in the first place? No idea. Like the Porgs from “The Last Jedi”, this character seems like it exists to only sell more toys and whose presence is completely unnecessary.
-Here’s Lookin’ At You: Another compliment I have to pay to this movie is when our characters go to the planet where Babu Frik can extract the Sith language information from C3PO. As our protagonists are sneaking around under the cover of darkness, trying to not be detected, the cinematography and lighting are extremely well done. It reminded me of prisoners trying to avoid the spotlights and escape from the prison. The look of everything was really well done and worth noting.
-Bad Guys vs. Hood Guys: While on the planet to locate Babu Frik, our heroes are seen wandering around in hoods and costumes that will remind you of whenever MCU characters are trying to blend in with the public and not be seen. Where did they get these outfits? They didn’t bring them and if they were on the ship they were on, what are the chances that the exact sizes would fit them? This is very minor but shows once again that the film makers wanted to distract you with spectacle so you never question the logic of what is going on on the screen.
-Zori to Bother You: When we first meet Zori, who Poe has a past with, she clearly hates him a lot. She threatens to kill him/turn him in and even says, “I want to see your brains in the snow.” Yikes. Yet within a minute she does a complete 180 and agrees to help them. This turnaround is so quick it will give you whiplash and makes zero sense from a character stand point.
-One of These is Not Like the Other: When our characters find out Poe used to be a spice runner he defends himself and says how Finn used to be a Storm Trooper and Rey used to be a scavenger. While perhaps embarrassing, being a scavenger is not even close to being on the level of running spice (highly illegal) or being a Storm Trooper (working for the worst people in the galaxy). And even in the case of Finn, he didn’t do it by choice and abandoned the First Order when he could so Poe trying to throw shade at the two of them makes no sense with his argument.
-Zori For What I’m About To Do: After not getting anywhere with Zori through talking, Rey beats her down and puts her lightsaber to Zori, which is essentially threatening to kill her. If a stranger you didn’t know beat you and threatened to kill you, the last thing you would do is want to be their best friend but Zori goes off on how much she likes Rey and then Rey echoes the sentiment. It is an odd exchange that has no basis in reality. It was as if the writers wanted to hurry up and rush to the moment where they are good friends so they skipped the actual development and dialogue to get them there and just flashed forward to the end result.
-Ramp Things Up: While very minor, as our characters are walking up stairs to get to Babu Frik’s place, the stairs have a slanted ramp for BB8 to roll up. The chances of all stairs having a BB8 sized ramp (R2D2 would be too big to fit on the ramp so what gives?) and following what equates to handicap accessibility laws is laughable at best and insulting at worst.
-What the Frik?: Look, Babu Frik is adorable. He has a great voice and laugh and is zany so I get the appeal. However, he is also just there to sell toys and doesn’t really have any personality or character traits. Just like Porgs in “The Last Jedi”, Babu Frik is purely a merchandising stunt.
-C3PGO!: Another positive aspect about this movie is C3PO. Throughout the prequel trilogy and the newest trilogy, R2D2 and C3PO are useless and only around because they are familiar characters. All they do is hang out in the background and annoy us. So it is very refreshing to finally have C3PO matter and have his character be integral to the plot. Even though his subplot brings about its share of problems, it is great to have his character do something of substance and matter for once so I was thrilled to see him have something to do.
-RAMming Speed: It is established that our characters can back up C3PO’s memory but that R2D2 is unreliable and it may not work. So why not back up C3PO’s memory onto something else? I am sure with all of the infinite technology across the galaxy that they could easily back up the memory of a dated droid without the use of R2D2 and to suggest otherwise is pretty insulting.
-Giving Hux the Finger: General Hux asks Kylo Ren if a city should be destroyed which is a totally legitimate question (although knowing that Hux is now a spy begs the question as to why a “good guy” would put the idea into Kylo’s head to destroy an entire city) and Kylo angrily responds by pointing a finger at Hux, not verbally responding and then walking away. You’d think Kylo would want to blow up a city so why wouldn’t he? Why was he angered by such a basic question? Why no answer? Moments like these are very nonsensical.
-The Medallion: Zori spouts some awkwardly, clunky exposition about the “First Order Captain’s Medallion” which felt very unnatural, followed by an invitation to come with her (completely out of character from five minutes prior) and we also have no idea where she got the medallion from. For such a valuable object, you’d think it would be extremely hard for someone like her to get unless it was stolen but to make things easy on the plot, she just randomly has one. How convenient.
-Not a Crate Job: It is alluded to how in “The Last Jedi” no one came to the Battle of Crate to help out the Resistance, yet as we see later in this movie, EVERYONE and their mother shows up to the final battle, which felt really ridiculous and dumb that there would be that wide of a gap between the help received in the last movie and the help received in this one.
-Poeuty Face: After Poe turns down Zori’s offer to go with her, he invites her to come with them. She gives no answer but doesn’t accept. I don’t know why the two screenwriters got the idea that it is good writing for characters to just flat out ignore questions they are asked, as if humans do that all the time. Why she doesn’t just say “no” is beyond me. The bigger issue though is why wouldn’t she go? She was planning to leave this planet anyways, she could have kept her medallion and it sure seemed like she didn’t have a lot going on or some job she needed to get back to. She had free range to go wherever she would like so why not join our heroes?
-Lost in the Sauce: As our heroes are sneaking onto the First Order ship to get Chewy back Poe asks, “Which way?” to which Finn responds, “No idea, follow me.” Why would you follow someone who has no idea where they are going? Shouldn’t they have plotted out somewhat of a plan before showing up only to wing it?
-Daggers and Naggers: Since the dagger had the coordinates to the way finder and they got the coordinates from Babu Frik hacking into C3PO, they no longer need the dagger because they already know where they are going once they retrieve Chewy. Yet once they get onto the First Order ship, they say they need the dagger. In reality they do because of the piece that extends out to reveal where specifically the way finder is (more on that later) but they have no idea that it extends out with that information. As far as they know, the dagger just has coordinates so the movie cheats by our characters magically knowing they will need it for later when in reality they would have had no way of knowing that.
-Can’t Stop the Feeling: After a character asks another character, “Why?” the response is, “A feeling”. Unless you are a character that specifically has the Force, using your feelings as a way to excuse certain decisions is just insanely lazy writing, which this movie has a lot of.
-Missed Your Shot: As Poe, Finn and Chewy are clearing their way through the First Order ship, roughly three different Storm Troopers sneak up behind our three heroes and therefore have clear shots to take them out. Every shot they fire misses. Shooting while facing each other is difficult because you can see what is coming and therefore take evasive actions. But to have the complete element of surprise and sneak up behind someone and still miss every shot when it is your job to be a soldier is just pathetic and stupid.
-Oh Poe!: I think this Star Wars movie has a first for the franchise in it…a Storm Trooper shoots someone! Shocking, I know. A Storm Trooper manages to hit Poe (non-lethally of course) and Poe is in pain and struggling over the course of the next couple of scenes in that location. Then once they leave the First Order ship for the entire rest of the movie that we see him doing battle, running around, being active, etc. he is totally fine, like he didn’t just get shot 10 minutes prior. Since I guess everyone has the Force now, maybe he has Force healing powers. If Rey would have healed his wound, this all would have made sense but since she didn’t and he recovered super quickly, the First Order might want to give their Storm Troopers stronger blasters.
-Please Don’t Steal: So Kylo Ren knows that there is a spy/traitor on board as this has been established. Yet in his chambers he has this super-duper important dagger that he doesn’t want falling into the hands of his enemies just sitting out in the open for anyone like a spy or his enemies to come in and steal. You’d think it would at least be locked up in some kind of safe/vault or I would even settle for in his dresser hidden underneath his underwear. But nope; he leaves it out in the open, unguarded like leaving stacks of cash out when you have a new cleaning company come clean your house and then you leave. Not very smart for a supposedly smart character.
-Return of the Retcon: Kylo Ren told Rey in “The Last Jedi” that her parents were no one, which obviously wasn’t true because one of her parents was the child of Emperor Palpatine. So J.J. Abrams had to retcon and change that and now Rey gets told in this movie that her parents “Chose to be no one” which also doesn’t really make sense since you don’t choose who you are born to so one of her parents never chose to be a Palpatine but they definitely were.
-Who’s the Puppet Master?: In “The Last Jedi”, Snoke reveals that he has been the one connecting Kylo and Rey’s Force Skype chats. Now that he has died and gone, who exactly is connecting them? Is it Palpatine? Have Kylo and Rey learned to connect themselves? We have no idea because the movie doesn’t care to tell us at all. Another question left unanswered regarding Rey’s parents is how Kylo Ren knew anything about Rey’s parents in the first place. Who told him? None of this information is ever revealed leaving us with more questions than answers.
-Go Out On A Limb: To make it seem like General Hux was overpowered and that was how Finn, Poe and Chewy escaped, Hux tells Finn to shoot him in the arm. Finn instead shoots him in the leg. Why though? Hux just saved your life when he could have killed you and even took the lives of other Storm Troopers to save you. He has been funneling useful information to the Resistance and been a valuable asset. So why shoot him in the leg? Another minor mystery left unexplained.
-Get Your Hux in a Row: General Hux says, “I don’t care if you win, I need Kylo Ren to lose” when asked why he is betraying the First Order. I’m sorry for not believing that someone who has seemingly served the First Order his entire career, has climbed up in the ranks to make it all the way to becoming a General and has never previously shown signs of a shred of disloyalty (quite the opposite actually) is doing a complete 180 because a co-worker is mean to him. I served with a couple of real pricks in the Marine Corps and never once did I think, “You know what, screw America. I’m gonna help ISIS because I don’t like my squad leader.” Press X to doubt on this one.
-Doesn’t (di)ad Up: This next critique simply goes to Abrams and his co-writer making up new Force rules as they went along. A “Force Diad” has never been a thing in Star Wars lore before and it therefore feels disingenuous to have it suddenly be a huge, meaningful deal out of nowhere. I just wasn’t buying it.
-Moves Like Dagger: This is one of the more ridiculous elements of the movie and how this entire dagger works. You would never know that a piece of it pulls out and extends to create a miniature map of the destroyed Death Star that shouldn’t even exist in the first place. But even if we allow that, the fact that Rey discovers this at the exact moment that she is standing in the exact spot she needs to be in for the dagger map to line up with the Death Star is insane. If she would have been too far away, too close, any more to the right, any more to the left, on any other side of the Death Star, holding it upside down, etc. literally anywhere but that exact spot, the dagger map wouldn’t have worked. The final insult comes in the realization that this Death Star is in the middle of a raging ocean and it not stable at all due to it being destroyed. After years of taking a pounding from strong waves, storms and nature in general on a crumbling hunk of junk, this Death Star would definitely shift, move, sink, etc. This Death Star is not staying in that same place forever so what are the chances that it is in the exact spot from when the dagger map was made all the way up to Rey stumbling across it? How did Rey even know to fiddle with it so that a piece of it would extend/come out?
-Mind if I Mind Read?: Palpatine is seen questioning Kylo Ren’s motives which begs the question why doesn’t Palpatine just read Kylo’s mind to figure out if he is loyal to him or is gravitating towards Rey and the Light Side of the Force? The problem with having things like mind reading as a Force power is when the most powerful character in the galaxy then decides not to use it during times where it would come in handy.
-Live Star: If I haven’t already made it abundantly clear, there is no way any piece of the Death Star should still exist, let alone the gigantic amount that does in this film. If you go back and watch its complete explosion in “Return of the Jedi” you will see that the entire Death Star was destroyed. Also, even if parts of it weren’t disintegrated, it would have burned up upon entering the planet’s atmosphere that it crashed onto AND the ocean waves constantly beating up on it would have at least had it sink to the bottom of the ocean. Even worse, a little later when Rey is inside of it, the automatic doors are still fully functioning and opening/closing. Uh….no.
-The Runaway Club: When it was revealed in “The Force Awakens” how Finn was a runaway/defector from the First Order, that was an original take on a bad guy turning good and something we hadn’t seen in any previous film in the Star Wars saga. Now, the black girl that Finn meets and is talking to as they repair the Millennium Falcon reveals that she and a ton of others all defected and left the First Order. She says an entire company mutinied which seems super unlikely considering they all would have been put to death or hunted down. Abrams took an original idea and then applied it to large swaths of people which felt recycled, unrealistic and lazy.
-Shelter from the Storm: I pointed out in my review for “The Last Jedi” how Rey is from a desert planet and the chances of her knowing how to swim would be extremely low, yet she swam in that movie. This time around, Rey, who has had no boating or sailing experience knows how to fully function and operate an amphibious vehicle, navigate the seas during extremely rough weather and safely get to her destination. Another example of her being a Mary Sue and the writers not fully understanding her as a character but instead taking the easy way out.
-ArgueD2 Part 2: As mentioned earlier, one of the best moments the movie offers are scenes of tensions between our heroes, where they test each other’s limits and we see their friendships get strained. We get another moment between Finn and Poe as they argue that is a really strong moment in the movie. The only problem with it is that Finn says that he knows what Rey is going through, although he clearly doesn’t and Poe doesn’t call him out on that but overall this is another great moment I wish we would have seen more of.
-Ain’t No Climb: Rey, having successfully reached the Death Star remains does a long climb to get to the top section where she needs to go. Yet earlier in the movie we saw how far she can jump, which she doesn’t utilize here and much like when she was sinking into the quick sand, she decides to slowly climb instead of using her levitation Force abilities to get to her destination quicker. Why didn’t she take the faster, easier way up?
-Games of Thrones: As much as I have already harped on the fact that the Death Star is still existing, automatic doors are still working, etc., the fact that Palpatine’s chair is still intact and sitting there as a symbolic message to the audience may look cool, but is completely unbelievable in its existence.
-DJ Williams, Spin that Shit: Even though overall John Williams provided his most underwhelming Star Wars score to date, around this time in the movie we get to hear some excellent remixed music from older Star Wars films mixed in with some new stuff. So although the overall score didn’t do too much for me, individual moments like this really do get your emotions going, which I commend.
-Finder’s Keeper: I found it extremely convenient that at the exact second that Rey drops the way finder, Kylo Ren at that precise moment happened to show up there to pick it up. Such a conveniently timed entrance on Kylo’s part for it to end up that way.
-T-t-t-t-today Saber: Rey pulls out her light saber and ignites it, threatening Kylo’s safety and he takes an obscenely long time to pull out his saber to fight back, despite having the chance to multiple times. I guess Abrams thought it would look cool to let them fight a little bit with one of them having their saber out and the other not, instead of what the characters would have realistically done, which is both pull out their sabers in a timely manner to even the playing field.
-No Maz: This next one is brief but I’d just like to point out how clunky the exposition is when Maz (a character who really did nothing over the span of three different movies) talks about Leia’s death, so the audience knows what is going on.
-Putting the Light in Light Saber: One important thing that this movie failed to do that even the prequels did extremely well were the light saber battles. As I watched Rey and Kylo having their light saber duel with the ocean waves crashing around them, I thought how cool the environment/special effects around them looked cool but how unremarkable their light saber battle was. There wasn’t a single moment involving a fight scene in the entire movie that wowed or awed me. The fight choreography was bland and unimpressive, which is especially disappointing for the finale of a nine film saga.
-Jump Day: Even though we see a hint of Rey’s jumping skills at the beginning of the movie during her training section, we’ve never seen her or Kylo be able to jump as high and far as they do during their ocean set final fight together. Rey we assume developed this skill during her training but when did Kylo learn this ability? And can The Force really make your body physically do things it used to not be able to do? I get your mind growing stronger so you can read minds, connect to other people’s mind(s), move things with your mind, etc. All mind powers essentially. But to make your legs stronger so you can run faster and jump higher seemed silly to me, like I was watching someone playing Crash Bandicoot.
-The Tides Have Turned: When Rey and Kylo battled in “The Force Awakens”, it was laughable that Rey, who had never fought with a light saber before could beat a powerful, highly trained Sith like Kylo Ren. Flash forward to the end of this movie. Kylo is conflicted and in a fragile mental state. Rey has been training consistently and getting so much stronger with the Force that she was able to bring down an entire ship and completely destroy it. So when they fight this time, Rey should now have the upper hand since she has grown so much stronger since their last meeting but Abrams reverses the stupidity from “The Force Awakens” and stupidly has Kylo easily defeating Rey as she struggles to keep up. Makes no sense. You can see Rey quickly growing tired during the fight, barely able to slowly swing her light saber.
-Forced Skype: This next one is a simple question. We’ve seen Luke Skywalker, probably the most powerful Jedi up until his death die from Force projecting himself somewhere and now Princess Leia dies from a similar circumstance. So if powerful Jedis and Force sensitive people can easily die from using the Force, how are Rey and Kylo able to do their Force Skype talking/communicating across insanely far distances and not be hurt or impacted by that at all? Seems very inconsistent to me.
-Exit Stage…?: Once Rey takes Kylo’s ship after their duel on the Death Star, how is Kylo able to get off of the Death Star and leave when the ship he came in is gone? Never explained.
-What a Mother…: When Leia dies from basically just speaking to her son, which seems rather ridiculous, she barely says anything to Ben Solo, which seemed like a missed opportunity. Although I know this was due to Carrie Fisher’s actual death, I felt this could have been handled better.
-Chewying the Scenery: One positive moment that I really liked was the scene where Chewy learns of his friend Leia’s death and is appropriately heartbroken and lets out a heart wrenching yell as he falls to his knees. You can feel his pain and the scene was handled very well.
-Force Ghost/Not Force Ghost: A big surprise was the brief return of Han Solo. I did enjoy him showing up and providing an emotionally strong moment. However, he is not a Force Ghost. He wasn’t a Jedi and he isn’t shaded in a blue hue as Force Ghosts are. So how are the dead now able to astro project anywhere and communicate with the living? We haven’t seen characters do this before outside of Force Ghosts so this goes to another element that Abrams has just made up as he has gone along, disregarding precedent and the established cannon. It may have been a nice moment but it came at the expense of the Star Wars cannon.
-A Light Between Oceans: Before Kylo somehow leaves the Death Star, he throws his light saber into the ocean. Since he will need a light saber later, this was an extremely short sighted decision and very stupid thing to do for no reason whatsoever.
-Ship Shape: A ship having the capability to destroy planets and be equipped with “star destroyers” is no easy feat. That is why the Death Star and the Death Star 2.0 from “The Force Awakens” were such gigantic ships with thousands of men and women working on them. Yet now we are supposed to just go along with the fact that normal sized ships are all equipped with star destroyers, which is the equivalent of saying that the latest iPhone is now able to launch nuclear weapons. If building star destroyers was that easy, then each one could all attack a different planet at once and basically wipe out the entire galaxy, or at least the planets harboring any good guys. But that would make the villains intelligent, which they are not in this movie. Also, why haven’t any of the good guys used this technology to blow up large areas that contain any bad guys?
-Wanted…Dead or Alive?: Palpatine tells Rey on Exigle that he always wanted her alive. He wanted her kept alive so she could come to him, join him and the two remaining Palpatines could rule the galaxy together. So then why did Palpatine order Kylo Ren to kill Rey? What if he would have actually killed her and ruined Palpatine’s plans? Seems very inconsistent to me.
-Force(d) Luke: As Rey is about to throw her light saber into a smoldering fire, Force Ghost Luke catches it to stop this from happening. He tells her a Jedi should respect their weapon. First off, this is basically ret con for the disrespect he showed to his own saber in “The Last Jedi” which I liked since that moment in “The Last Jedi” was out of character and garbage, but the bigger problem is Abrams again making things up as he goes along and now showing that Force Ghosts can physically interact in the real world. They can touch things, prevent things from happening, etc. So why isn’t there an army of Force Ghosts just stepping in and helping the good guys fight, killing all the bad guys since they are basically indestructible and immune to harm and can interact with the physical, living world? A really dumb moment to include. Abrams should have just had him talk her out of throwing the saber instead of actually physically catching it.
-Off of her Reydar: Here is another question to be posed: Why did no one tell Rey that she was a Palpatine? Apparently Luke and Leia as well as her parents and possibly Kylo Ren knew. Palpatine himself obviously knew. Why was this kept hidden from young Rey? Did she even know who Palpatine was at a young age so would it have mattered? In “The Last Jedi” Luke asked her, “Who are you?” Did he just not know this was Rey Palpatine since he hadn’t met her before? Because he should have known exactly who she was or at least been able to use the Force to sense how powerful she was. He says, “I’ve seen this raw strength only once before…” so he should have put two and two together and not needed to ask her who she was.
-Holding Onto the Past: Luke says in “The Last Jedi”, “It’s time for the Jedi to end.” He goes to burn and destroy the Jedi books/sacred texts so he is clearly getting rid of all things Jedi related. Yet we find out in this movie that he has kept his sister’s light saber, a Jedi weapon. So why keep it?
-Back in the Stone (De)age: A positive aspect is overall how excellent of a job the visual effects department did with de-aging Luke and Leia in their training flashback. Although Luke looks a little bit more realistic than Leia, they both still look solid and the de-aging Star Wars visuals have come a long way in the three short years since “Rogue One: A Star Wars Story”. Well done.
-A Tale of Two Shippies: This next complaint involves two ships. First, Rey has burned the ship that she stole from Kylo Ren and it has been completely destroyed. How convenient is it then that the way finder that was inside of it is perfect intact, works fine and hasn’t been burned or melted in any way, like the entire rest of the ship that it was in, which is ridiculous. Then, we see Luke’s ship get raised from underneath the ocean for Rey to be able to pilot. But think about it, this ship has been underwater for over 30 years and is probably a solid 40 years old at a minimum. There is no way this ship is fully functioning and able to fly anywhere and to suggest so is really quite dumb.
-Memory, All Alone in the Sanctuary Moonlight: It turns out that R2D2 had C3PO’s memory all along. So why did R2D2 never communicate this to anybody and why did it seem like there was such a high risk that C3PO’s memory would be lost forever if that wasn’t the case at all?
-Nav It Your Way: So all of these large ships that Palpatine has are each equipped with the ability to destroy entire planets yet none of them can even take off without a navigation tower? Yes sir, this car can go up to 150MPH but it can’t steer, I hope that is cool. What sense does this make? Abrams had some dumb ideas with his Death Star 2.0 back in “The Force Awakens” but having these ships not be able to take off without a nav tower takes the cake in terms of terrible engineering ideas.
-Hopin’ Out for a Hero: One of the lines from the script goes, “We’ve got friends out there. People will come if they have hope.” Aww isn’t that sweet? Then why did absolutely no one show up during the final battle in “The Last Jedi” if they had friends out there? Why would those people have not had hope back then but have more hope now, despite facing much worse odds and the most powerful Sith Lord in the galaxy?
-Need for (Hyper) Speed: This next one is literally just me posing a question…can every ship jump to hyper speed? From older films in this saga I had assumed only certain ships could but as time has gone on is that ability just something that has been built into all of the new models of ships? Seems like if every ship can do it, it isn’t a big deal and loses what made it special in the first place but I honestly don’t know so perhaps if you are still reading this far you can point me to the answer in the comment section.
-Don’t Have a Dog in this Fight: Just as I previously mentioned how the light saber battles/fights just didn’t do much to wow, impress or awe me, the aerial dog fights in this movie similarly do not inspire my jaw to drop at all. The dog fights between ships are rather generic and nothing we haven’t already seen before. The film makers seemed to have gone with quantity over quality as they throw hundreds and hundreds of ships onto the screen but without conveying a sense of direction or purpose to the madness and chaos.
-Hooked on a Feeling: Again, Finn has never had a hint of Force sensitivity shown to be about him but suddenly he just knows where the signal is coming from. When asked how he knows that the signal is coming from that specific spot, Finn says it is because of “a feeling”. AKA the screenwriters couldn’t think of a way that made sense to have our heroes figure it out, so they slapped the Force onto a character who has never had it before so we could get a half assed explanation. Yikes.
-Get off your High Horse: A thought I had as I saw troops riding on horseback on top off these giant ships flying through the air was how high up are these ships? I guess they could be moving slowly enough for people to not fly off of them but wouldn’t it at the very least be super windy up that high and would they possibly have trouble breathing, talking and communicating. If you tried to stick some people on horses on top of an airplane moving super slowly at 30,000 feet, I somehow don’t think that would end very well.
-Palpatinez II Men: On Exigle we see the giant arena with Palpatine’s fanboys who seem to make up an operatic choir, adding to the movie’s score. Who are these people? Did Palpatine create them? Are they clones, humans, Sith? Is their only purpose to make ominous musical contributions to Palpatine for dramatic effect when he has visitors? A lot of questions with no answers given to us as the audience.
-Rage Against His Machine: Emperor Palpatine is so powerful he can basically bring himself back to life after death, create life (like Snoke), create a vast army in terms of people (or clones) and ships all equipped with the power to destroy planets, etc. So you would think that he would have the power to function off of life support, right? Wrong. We see Palpatine weak looking and attached into this machine, seemingly keeping him alive. Can’t he make a new body for himself? How was he able to accomplish so much while confined to this machine? Did he make the machine himself and how did he get into it? So many questions and not the most intimidating look for the galaxy’s most powerful senior citizen.
-The Unholy Spirit: Palpatine tells Rey that if she kills him, his spirit will pass into her. Since when was that ever a thing in the Star Wars saga? That has never happened before with any other characters, related or not in any of these films. Exhibit Q of Abrams making things up as he goes along.
-Stay With Me: Finn meets that black girl who also defected from the First Order and they fight in the final battle alongside each other but have only known each other for about five minutes when she tells Finn, “I’m staying with you.” It is supposed to be an emotional moment but to me it just felt like cheating. They don’t know each other. Doesn’t she have friends like her fellow Storm Troopers who left the First Order? Her jumping to want to stay with Finn is a serious red flag of a Stage 5 clinger. Run Finn, run!
-Wrong Again: Palpatine tries to demean Rey further by saying that, “No one is coming to help them.” in reference to her friends fighting the areal battle. Wouldn’t Palpatine, in all of his immense power and wisdom with the Force be able to sense the literal thousands of ships and people coming towards his planet? I haven’t seen a prediction this wrong since Buzzfeed gave Hillary Clinton a 98% chance of becoming the President back in 2016.
-To Become or Not to Become: Speaking of Palpatine being dead wrong, Rey does kill him but his spirit doesn’t enter her and he just dies like any other human being would. So why did he tell her that? Did he honestly think that would happen and was just mistaken or was he bluffing? We will never know and Abrams doesn’t know either since he pulled it out of his ass.
-How Kylo Can You Go?: When Kylo magically shows up on Exigle, he proceeds to get his ass kicked by some unknown henchmen that he should be way more powerful than. I guess a light saber could have come in handy for him to fight with but he was too busy throwing that into the ocean for some reason.
-Give ‘em a Minute: There is a moment during the fight near the end where Kylo and Rey freeze so they can Force communicate/sense each other, which is fine. What is not fine is that while they freeze to longingly stare off, the bad guys don’t take advantage of their stillness and attack while Rey/Kylo are distracted. Instead, they freeze too, ensuring the audience that neither Rey nor Kylo are in any real danger from these henchmen.
-Teleport of Entry: As touched upon earlier, this new found ability/Force move of teleportation conveniently makes its way into this movie and Rey teleports a light saber to Kylo, so he can fight off the henchmen who have been kicking his ass. If objects can be teleported, then couldn’t anyone in danger just teleport away before they die? When the First Order was chasing the Resistance through space in “The Last Jedi”, why didn’t they all just teleport to a location unknown to the First Order? This lazy writing opens up another can of worms.
-It’s a Bird, It’s a Plane, It’s Good Guys Ex Machina: Not only is Lando able to somehow recruit every good person in the galaxy in an extremely short amount of time and coordinate an attack with them all but they all just so happen to show up at the exact same moment when our heroes seem to be all but defeated and in need of help. What if all these good guys would have shown up half an hour later and been running a little late? Would all of our heroes died? Probably. Thank God for convenient timing on the part of this gargantuan group of Resistance fighters.
-Right Out in the Open: As ridiculous as it was that every ship in the Emperor’s fleet has planet killing cannons, what is even dumber is the fact that they are all extremely vulnerable and unprotected. You’d think you would want to have the most important aspect of your ship heavily fortified for its safety and protection but apparently not.
-Get a Life Force: Another new Force power that Abrams made up for this movie occurs as we see Palpatine begin sucking the life out of Rey and Kylo, draining them. Not only have we never seen this before but it somehow doesn’t kill them, even though Luke dies from astro projecting himself and Leia can survive floating out in space with no breathable air but dies from a brief Skype call to her son. What kills and doesn’t kill characters is so inconsistent and a total joke overall. Consider also that Kylo gets Force thrown AKA Force Yeeted by Palpatine and falls down quite some length but doesn’t die. He just limps for a little bit.
-Decease Lightning: One of the most glaring problems for me that no one talked about in the climax of the movie involved Palpatine shooting a ton of Force lightning up into the sky. Here is why that didn’t make any sense. First of all, his Force lightning only hit the good guy’s ships. Not a single bad buy from his fleet got hit. Now maybe he is powerful enough to directly shoot off Force lightning in thousands of different directions all at once, controlling where the lightning hits. Maybe I can buy that. But what I can’t buy however is that while the Force lightning disabled all of the good guy’s ships for over a full minute, the bad guys didn’t take advantage of this and blast every single good guy out of the sky. The good guys were blinded and unable to fire while the bad guys were fully functioning, yet somehow none of our heroes die. What do you take us for, Abrams?
-CNN Palpatine: Palpatine tells Rey, “You are nothing – a scavenger girl is no match for me.” Uh, excuse me Mr. Fake News but you know very well that she isn’t a scavenger girl. You know she is your granddaughter and extremely powerful so why say such a dumb, untrue line to her?
-Come on Baby, Light My…Force: So Palpatine begins shooting Force lightning at Rey to kill her. She busts out a Reverse Uno card and begins pushing his Force lightning back at him. He begins to have the effects of the Force lightning start to destroy him. You would think he would have just stopped shooting the Force lightning that was literally killing him, but for some reason he forgets about the Off Switch and he dies from his own Force lightning mixed with a heavy dosage of stupidity.
-When He Returns: Palpatine dies and is defeated. YAY! But wait, that happened at the end of “Return of the Jedi”. So why not just wait around for like…6 to 8 movies and then come back since death doesn’t seem to stop him. It only makes him more powerful. Nothing and no one ever dies in the Star Wars lore, right?
-Temple Run 9: Once Palpatine is defeated, the Sith Temple begins to crumble and the entire Sith Tabernacle Choir gets killed by the massive amounts of falling debris. Luckily, Rey and Kylo have absolutely no ruble fall on them. They were hanging out in the rubble free zone I guess. How convenient for them.
-Forced Finn: In another random show of the Force for Finn, he “feels” Rey’s death, before Kylo revives her. Just another example of Finn having the Force when he never did before this movie but the plot called for it now so he gets Force moments out the wazoo.
-The Bride of Forcenstein: Rey straight up dies. Kylo Force heals her back to life. So how long can someone be dead for before they are brought back to life? Can Luke or Leia be brought back to life or is there a specific window of time, like an hour or the run time of an episode of “The Mandalorian” before then they stay dead and can’t be brought back? How does any of this work?
-Force Heal or No Heal: Here is my problem with Kylo bringing back Rey from the dead; how does he even have the ability to? He is in a weakened state from getting beat up by henchmen and Palpatine and is barely able to walk, he has never Force healed anything before, let alone brought someone back from the dead, etc. He knows Force healing exists since Rey Force healed him but how does he know he can bring someone back from the dead?
-Kiss by a Rey on the Grave: Rey and Kylo have their big kiss moment and although I am ok with them kissing in theory, the lead up to it (or lack therof) makes it so this kiss was never earned. For the duration of the trilogy we were given clues that Finn had a thing for Rey (sorry Rose, no one likes you) so if they would have gotten a kissing moment, it would have made sense due to their chemistry and will they/won’t they back and forth. We never got any hint of romance between Kylo and Rey. They always felt like a brother/sister relationship (although that never stopped Luke and Leia, am I right, folks?) so having them suddenly get romantic feels nice in the moment but when you reflect on it afterwards, it cheapens the impact and is never earned.
-Let the Bodies Hit the Floor: Another super inconsistent aspect of these movies in the new trilogy also deals with death. When Kylo Ren dies, his body immediately disappears. When Rey died, her body hung around for minutes until it was brought back to life. When Leia died, her body hung around for hours before disappearing. It is almost as if the bodies disappear based off what the screenplay calls for, instead of being consistent in any way, shape or form.
-Pander Bear: We all heard about it. We saw the headlines. Disney is so woke that they will have the first same sex kiss in a Star Wars film! So progressive. Much woke. Very forward moving. I am fine with gay or lesbian characters where their sexuality is an important part of who they are (I had “Moonlight” and “The Handmaiden” in my Top 10 Best Films of the Year in the years that they came out) but to shoehorn in a random, meaningless lesbian kiss for no reason but to pander to the gay community is insulting to the gay community (it degrades them to a demographic that can be paid off by .2 seconds of screen time to make them happy) and eye rollingly cringe worthy to everyone else who paid to see a Star Wars movie, not a bullshit political statement.
-Don’t Medal with the Past: Star Wars nerds…uh, I mean fans always complained that Chewy never got a medal when everyone else did back in the original trilogy so Abrams has to give Chewy a medal in a completely forced, over the top manner that makes fans roll their eyes and non-fans wonder why the Hell he is getting a medal and no one else is.
-That was Awkward: Remember the black gal who befriends Finn super quickly and wants to stay with him, even though she doesn’t know him? Well at the end of the movie, she is next to Lando and he asks her where she is from. She says that she doesn’t know and he replies with, “Well let’s find out.” It comes off as a super creepy/awkward moment. Is he hitting on her and suggesting they shack up and go off on an adventure to go Ancestry.com her past to figure out where she comes from and that she is more Native American than Elizabeth Warren? Or is he trying to be a father figure and help her out? We don’t know but we do know how weird this moment came out and how unnecessary it was to include at all.
-Return of the J…awas: The last moment of joy that the movie brought me was when we see some Jawas back on Tatooine and we hear one of them shout the classic, “Houdini!” line. Yes, it may be another nostalgic call back, but like the Wilhelm scream, it is one that never gets old and that you have to enjoy every time you hear it.
-Homeage to Luke: Speaking of call backs, we get some more forced nostalgia by Rey going back to Luke’s home on Tatooine to bury his and Leia’s light sabers and for the movie to play with our emotions in a hollow way. The movie can’t think of an original ending, so it takes the closing shot from a superior Star Wars movie instead.
-For Namesake: For the second time in the movie, a random stranger suddenly gets a strong urge to ask for Rey’s name. Not just her first name though, that isn’t good enough. The stranger has to know her full name. Since that is a thing that always happens when I introduce myself to people. I say my name is Jarrod and they are always baffled that I didn’t give my full name so they can better understand my family lineage so then I have to tell them my last name is Hallman. When the stranger asks, “Rey who?”, Rey stares off into the distance for an awkwardly long amount of time (the stranger must be like, “What the Hell is wrong with this girl? She doesn’t know her last name and has to think about it?”) before she commits identity theft and culturally appropriates the last name of Skywalker to end this nine film saga on a pretty weak note.
Well if you stuck around to read the entire extended review (the longest I have ever written), then congrats on being a huge Star Wars fanboy/fangirl. This took me weeks to write because there was so much ground to cover. The biggest problem with this entire trilogy is that each movie is so disconnected since they were made up as they went along and didn’t have a clear vision of an overall story arc when Disney greenlit this trilogy. Star Wars will always excel in the technical department with visuals, score, production design, costume design, stunt work, etc. Those elements, paired with the entertainment factor and despite all these flaws, being rather enjoyable to watch is why my score for this movie is what it is. The story, however, is where Star Wars has often fallen short. Even the prequels which had two terrible movies (I will gladly defend “Revenge of the Sith”) were well mapped out before hand and felt like a very contained, coherent story, split evenly amongst three movies, making it a bigger success overall than this new trilogy. The true Sith master here is Kathleen Kennedy and I won’t hold my breath for Disney to make a truly great Star Wars film while she is at the helm of this franchise. If you enjoy Star Wars, you will still see this movie and can get some enjoyment out of it but upon looking very closely at the movie, I am glad this underwhelming trilogy has come to an end and hopefully now we can let the past die. Kill it if we have to, even.
#TheFinnale / #BenIsBack2 / #5.5Reyting / #TheDeadDontDie2 / #GeneralPrydeComethBeforeTheFall / #PalpaGenePool
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