Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker

Well.. this was dull.

Let me give you a little context to understand better how I felt during this movie. Firstly: I'm NOT a big Star Wars fan. I like the movies and see them as a "good" franchise, but I wouldn't put any of them on my personal top lists.

I enjoy the art of the franchise way more than the story. I LOVE the music, the design of ships and the visual world building. I like some aspects of the overall story more than others of course, but none really come to mind when I think of what I like about the movies in general.

That being said, I felt "The Force Awakens" was really boring. Just a generic movie trying to do "the Star Wars things". It was fine but not in any way memorable to me.

"The Last Jedi" on the other hand really tried ignoring the big "Star Wars cult" and therefore entertained me the most of all the 9 movies. I prefered the focus on using the "Star Wars" world to tell a story rather then to tell another "Star Wars"-version.

"The Rise of Skywalker" now is at best as boring as "The Force Awakens" and very often a big punch in the face to everything I liked about "The Last Jedi". Obviously the higher ups at Disney decided to take notes on everything "the fans" disliked about the 8th movie and do some sort of "damage control" according to that feedback.

The movie hast way too much going on for reasons which are often non-existant or just plainly bad. Since the movie couldn't grab my focus I just happened to think more about the big plotholes and started nitpicking and sometimes even mocking the movie for certain decisions which I don't want to spoil here.

It's really a shame. I hope Disney will use the name in the future to do standalone movies of different genres, for example a racing movie in space would be great or a good action flick with one or two of the beloved characters.

If I had to give it a rating I would probably give the movie a 4-6/10. I only REALLY enjoyed one scene because I hoped for it to happen most of...

Went to the first showing in town tonight. I really enjoyed the film. Although it leaned heavy on nostalgia, it should, since it is wrapping up 40 years. I did not care for The Last Jedi, and was worried going in. Will do a deeper dive after I have seen it a few times.

It’s hard to write a review for this film without any major spoilers, so this might seem a little vague here and there. There will be very minor spoilers, primarily what’s revealed in the opening text crawl or the trailers, so not much, but if you want to go into this film completely virgin, stop here.

The film starts off with things already underway. A transmission has been sent out that contains the voice of Emperor Palpatine. Kylo Ren, now Supreme Leader of the First Order, goes to seek out Palpatine as a potential threat to his power. In the meantime, the Resistance is still in shambles after the events of “The Last Jedi,” and they are busy doing scouting missions and regrouping.

All of this is revealed in the opening crawl of the movie, which is where the problems begin. It violates a cardinal rule of storytelling: Show, don’t tell. It wouldn’t have taken much to have this done on screen in more dramatic and effective fashion. Instead, this has the effect of making it feel like we either missed something important or that we’re watching an entirely different movie with a different story. This makes things confusing. It doesn’t help that I was already thinking that J.J. Abrams probably needs to go back to Screenwriting 101 during the opening crawl. Not a good way to start.

Other things happen during the course of the movie that make no sense. Why does Kylo Ren reforge his helmet? We never really find that out. He just does. The Knights of Ren do appear in this film finally. Who are they? If you’re expecting an answer of any kind, you’ll be disappointed. Why is there this strange connection between Rey and Kylo Ren? One of the mysteries of the Force, I suppose. Characters who we don’t know appear from nowhere having been significant to the goings on even though we’ve never seen them before. Other characters take bizarre and up to now not even hints at character arcs. It becomes a horrendously confusing mess.

I liked some of the more controversial aspe...

When The Force Awakens was released the vast majority of fans liked it. They were practically watching a remake of A New Hope but it was enough for them. Although they never liked Rey. That damn feminist agenda right?

The Last Jedi took that from them, it got away from the formula and they went crazy. Who was that Rian Johnson and how he dare to change the characters that only they know how they should act?

They did not give them what they wanted and that annoyed them and it's ironic because many times they have complained about the saga and its direction and if something has become clear to me it's that the great majority only want the same, like in the original trilogy. And what does that mean? Fan service. And that's what Star Wars has become.

You don't believe me? Ask fans about the scene they liked the most about Rogue One. Vader's scene. A fan service scene.

And the fear of losing the ''fans'' forced Disney to undo what they were creating, they also threw Johnson and his film under the bus and they practically announced this new film like the one that came to fix the disaster. A shame and an insult to the director's work.

Rise of Skywalker in my opinion represents a setback and it doesn't matter that this is supposed to be the ending. It's a setback because they decided to play it safe and submit to the whims of the audience. While that does not translate into poor quality, it doesn't represent something worth mentioning either.

Star Wars represents pure and good entertainment but when it lacks surprises and feels so safe and predictable it means that you're sacrificing any emotional resonance and when it comes to the end of the 9 episodes, that emotion is simply not there. That shot of Rey looking at the two suns should have felt overwhelming and thrilling and I don't know about you but I didn't feel it and that was a huge letdown.

And that's what separates this ending from Return of The Jedi and Revenge of the Sith, even though it...

If you enjoy reading my Spoiler-Free reviews, please follow my blog @ https://www.msbreviews.com

If you don’t know by now, I’m a massive Star Wars fan. I love the original trilogy, but the prequels… not so much. However, Disney’s sequel trilogy has delivered two of my favorite movies of the whole franchise, so its conclusion was obviously one of my most anticipated moments of the year. If that wasn’t enough to leave everyone excited, add the fact that it also means the end of the Skywalker Saga, and the pressure suddenly becomes 10x heavier. I went in with moderately high expectations, with not even a glimpse of any trailer or TV spot, just like I did with Avengers: Endgame. The latter surpassed my expectations and delivered a near-perfect conclusion to the Infinity Saga…

The Rise of Skywalker is a tremendous letdown. I won’t sugarcoat it. If someone told me at the beginning of the year that J.J. Abrams wouldn’t be able to offer a satisfying end to the nine-episode story, I would laugh like crazy. It disappointed me so much that I don’t even want to extend this review more than the usual. I know that a lot of people hated The Last Jedi, but for better or worse, that film exists. Rian Johnson’s decisions were made. Some people received them well, some didn’t. But all of us got to watch and experience his narrative.

There’s something called artistic integrity, which J.J. Abrams and Chris Terrio completely forgot about. The lack of respect for the saga’s previous installment is baffling. The structure-less screenplay is so unbelievably convoluted that it reaches a point where evident logical issues come into play. Major plot points occur due to some genuinely hard-to-believe events, and even the characters seem to have no path whatsoever. It’s entertainment for the sake of entertainment.

Of course, there are a lot of visually jaw-dropping action sequences. The cinematography (Dan Mindel) is some of the best I’ve seen in the franchise and in this year. John...

5 reasons you'll love this movie:

You can't spoil the plot to anyone who hasn't seen it, because it doesn't HAVE a plot. Sure, stuff happens, and if you blab about it, you'll get asked "Who did what? When? Why?", and you won't be able to answer because you won't know either.

It validates your blind optimism over everyone else's cool deliberation, because our so-called heroes just blunder their way through every peril imaginable without any logic, strategy or preparedness, yet they come out unscathed for [reasons]. Often using guesswork, or was that "The Force"?

No need for you to remember any complicated story arcs, bothersome subtle clues or dramatic prophecy drops from throughout the series, because this final movie just makes up completely new stuff that you couldn't possibly have seen coming because it never existed before.

It's ridiculously easy to re-enact the movie at your next cosplay gathering, because the characterisations are so shallow and vapid that all you need to do is ad-lib the actors' lines, and you'll probably get a better script.

All that junk you've accumulated over the years will come in damn handy one day, just like it did for our so-called heroes. They managed to have everything they need on hand. So much so, that vitally important junk literally materialises right in front of them, and usually from places that makes you wonder why they never noticed it years ago.

This movie is really awesome. It took me two viewings to truly cement the way I truly feel about this film. But upon second viewing this film was not just an entertaining blast from start to finish but to be honest a perfect conclusion to the Skywalker story. The film traverses the stories of the previous films in order to bring all those stories together for a culmination that is truly satisfying. The cinematography and visual effects as usual are outstanding in the film but this film seems to have a unique feel that adds to the foreboding tone kept consistent throughout. Adam Driver and Daisy Ridley as Rey and Kylo truly shine in this film and are both giving their a - game and prove that they are both incredible actors and extremely emotionally flexible (particularly Ridley). The Arc of Kylo Ren is by far the highlight of this trilogy and in this film and the conclusion of said arc is immensely satisfying, Reys story also takes a surprising turn which I found immensely satisfying in hindsight. As a conclusion to my favourite series of all time I was left immensely pleased with the final sequence of the film which brings all of this lore together in a way I couldn’t predict to be this poignant. This film overall was a wonderful farewell to this saga that was so satisfying and enjoyable that I will look back on this saga with great nostalgia and adoration that I hope to show my children as a whole nine part saga and I am immensely honoured to have been part of this moment in pop culture and to get to view this conclusion is a truly wonderful thing for me. It’s with this i farewell the galaxy far far away with immense satisfaction.

This is some bullshit. You know it, I know it. Rise of Skywalker is not just a bad movie contained within itself, it's also a very bad sequel to Last Jedi. But that didn't stop me from having a really great time at the cinema with Episode IX. Twice.

Originally I started writing my review for it by writing two lists, one of all the dumb crap I didn't like, and one of all the dumb crap I did like, but A) it contained a lot of spoilers, and B) there's a lot of lists of the dumb crap in Rise of Skywalker out there already, so all I'll say is just this: The majority of complaints that people are making about Rise of Skywalker are fair and accurate, and whether you are a Star Wars fan or not, there is a very real chance you will not enjoy this movie. But between 2017 and 2019 I watched over 1500 movies, and I thought that this movie was one of the better ones.

Final rating:★★★½ - I really liked it. Would strongly recommend you give it your time.

I enjoyed it, but I did so with a sizeable asterisk

I said to Rian, "Jedis don't give up. I mean even if he had a problem he would maybe take a year to try and regroup, but if he made a mistake he would try and right that wrong." So right there we had a fundamental difference, but it's not my story anymore. It's somebody else's story, and Rian needed me to be a certain way to make the ending effective. That's the crux of my problem. Luke would never say that, I'm sorry – well in this version. See, I'm talking about the George Lucas Star Wars_. This is the next generation of_ Star Wars_, so I almost had to think of Luke as another character. Maybe he's Jake Skywalker. He's not my Luke Skywalker. But I had to do what Rian wanted me to do because it served the story. But I still haven't accepted it completely._

• Mark Hamill; Official Press Tour for Star Wars: The Last Jedi (December 18, 2017)

The Force Awakens, I think, was the beginning of something quite solid. The Last Jedi_, if I'm being honest, I'd say that was feeling a bit iffy for me. I didn't necessarily agree with a lot of the choices in that and that's something that I spoke to Mark [Hamill] a lot about and we had conversations about it._

• John Boyega; "John Boyega Is on His Own Hero's Journey" (Isaac Rouse); HyperBeast (December 8, 2019)

The Last Jedi is full of surprises and subversion and all sorts of bold choices. On the other hand, it's a bit of a meta approach to the story. I don't think that people go to Star Wars to be told, "This doesn't matter."

• J.J. Abrams; "Will Star Wars Stick the Landing? J.J. Abrams Will Try" (Dave Itzkoff); The New York Times (December 11, 2019)

Rian Johnson's Star Wars: The Last Jedi (2017) was a film which divided critics and audiences to an unusual degree – on Metacritic it has a critical score of 85/100 (the second-highest in the franchise), with 53 positive reviews against zero negative, but its audience score is...

“Do it!”

I’m surprised they added that in there despite all the memes.

Anyway…

A long time ago...four years to be distinct; the space opera ‘Star Wars’ returned to cinemas with ‘The Force Awakens', that brought back the bittersweet experience that fans have been craving for over 30 years. Well lets just say Christmas was magical that year. While I wasn’t quite as wowed as everyone else, but I still enjoyed it otherwise and I was interested where the story will go after J.J. Abrams left his “mystery box” of questions for another director to answer. How exciting and epic the next years will be.

And then the sequel and two spin-offs happened. Well lets just say my interest for these new movies has completely evaporated. Sad times indeed. And no I don’t feel like I’m being overly negative in the heat this movie is receiving, because right now, at this very moment, my thoughts and overall feeling on this movie are genuine, and re-watching it isn’t going to safe it. I’m not disappointed or angry, because at this point I stopped caring.

‘Rise of Skywalker’ is a factory made movie with no heart, no soul, and no magic. Words and phrases like: bold, epic, and satisfying - are not the type of words that I would describe this final chapter in the Skywalker saga. I can’t call something bold if it played things incredibly safe. Each movie exists just to shred up and apologize for what came before it.

J.J. Abrams can be hit or miss sometimes, but I must admit he had a difficult task to follow up on ‘Last Jedi’ and Rian Johnson undoing his mystery box questions. If that wasn’t bad enough, the death of Carrie Fisher also had a massive effect on the story, and including her into the movie, while respecting her legacy and giving her as much screen time with the limited deleted footage they have. Abrams sadly treads on familiar ground and doesn't really handle the originals (or even the prequels) with respect. This is literally a remake of ‘Return of The Jedi’.

The...