Star Wars The Rise of Skywalker (SPOILERS!)

[FlikTheBlue]

@Left_Hand_of_Dorkness

1. The Last Jedi set up a wonderful movie where the merest remains of the Resistance and the merest remains of the First Order are at one another’s throats in a universe where a lot of people are suddenly realizing their power. I really would’ve liked to have seen that movie instead of seeing Yet Another Planet-Buster Destroyed By Scrappy Heroes (now with more planet-busters!).
2. Palpatine didn’t make any goddamned sense, nor did his plan.

But I still had a lot of fun.

Some things I haven’t seen mentioned yet:
3) “Dad?” “I know” was the bestest call-back in the history of callbacks, repeating and recontextualizing Solo’s line just perfectly. I loved the hell out of that.
4) When Ben got the light saber from Rey, he gave this little apologetic shrug to his ex-besties before murdering them, and that shrug was hilarious.
5) Same thing with Poe’s little flirty head-waggle to his ex and her responding head-shake shoot-down and his accepting shrug. That was one of the funnier jokes in the series.
6) The image of Rey crossing her lightsabers as the Emperor shoots lightning at her has the makings of an excellent “OK BOOMER” meme, as soon as spoilers are allowed.
7) When Luke raised his old ship out of the water, his right hand gestured, but his left hand was off-screen. I leaned over and told my wife, “His other hand’s holding a White Russian.” The Luke Abides.
8) I like how Rey is so conflicted about whether to kill the Emperor–but she turns around and casually dispatches a horde of Imperial Guards or whoever those red-robed bastards were. They’re mooks, their deaths don’t push you to the dark side, apparently.

Abrams is a hot mess, and I cordially dislike most of the stuff he does, and I hate how he made Rey a Palpatine, and he missed a lot of slow-pitches from The Last Jedi IMO–but all that said, I was pretty satisfied with the movie.

I always thought it was the giving into hatred rather than the actual killing that led to turning to the dark side. Presumably for Rey or Luke before her to successfully strike down old Sheev they would have had to use some kind of inner rage to have enough strength to strike successfully. A cool dispassionate attempt would have probably failed. On the other hand, if it was somehow possible to kill Palpatine without flying into a rage, that wouldn’t lead to falling to the dark side.

[Asylum]

That movie was hot shit on toast. I was so goddamned bored that I would get confused as to what was going on, then remember I could rake my pre-frontal cortex to put it together, then ask myself “what the fuck did I do that for?” Guess I’m a sadist.

It was like they tried to cram everything and blinker fluid into the movie and they didn’t do any of it well. They visited more planets than the Kepler has discovered for no reason other the filmmakers wanted them to, the action scenes were confusing/stupid (horses attacking a starship? Guess JJ is a student of General Herr), the plot twists were stupidly out of nowhere or blazingly obvious (no Chewie body? not dead), Adam Driver is about as intimidating as a toothless chuiahua, they completely dropped character development for anyone not named Rey/Ren, the sudden arrival of reinforcements was so obviously coming that there was no sense of tension, and I could go on (and on, and on… and on). The net result was I didn’t care about anything in the movie.

The only thing I really enjoyed was the cameo by Ewan McGregor’s uncle.

And I’m a Star Wars nerd. I LIKED the prequels. I got the Thrawn trilogy in hardback when it first came out. I like putting SW Lego sets together. I even made excuses for the TFA and TLJ, telling myself that they had their moments, but wait until the trilogy ends to fully judge them.

The Rise of Skywalker is a bad, bad movie. No biscuit.

[Jonathan_Chance]

@Darren_Garrison

It is right up there with teleportation of themselves and objects and with levitating themselves (all past Jedi–even in the animated series–just fall, with dignity.)

Not…quite.

There’s on instance in the original Clone Wars shorts where Dooku levitates himself off a ledge and down to where Asajj Ventress is waiting. He looks pretty cool doing it.

[russian_heel]

Saw it tonight and liked it.

The inclusion of Carrie Fisher was 100% unnecessary. The movie should have started with Princess Leia dead. If they wanted to shoehorn her into the plot, have her and Han Solos “ghost” motivate Kylo Ren to turn face. I get it the movie was supposed to conclude the Leia story but the actress died and the cutting floor clips of her from Last Jedi were not only distracting, but she did nothing in them.

I really enjoyed the Exogol storyline. The storyline-driver concept of a secret Sith planet is the spookiest thing in the series since Darth Maul.

I also enjoyed the final battle scene when it seemed Poe was down and out, but Lando came through at the last minute with the massive fleet.

Could have done without the Poe-Vorii storyline. The encounter scene by the two was terribly written.

I have the move ranked #5 in the canon, below Rogue One and above Last Jedi. The million (actually billion) dollar question is when they do continue the series, is there really a generation of 50 something millenials REALLY pining for the callback of Rey, Poe and Finn like my generation marked out over the return of Han Solo, Luke Skywalker and Princess Leia?

I doubt it.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Darren_Garrison]

I think that the very biggest mistake about VII VIII and IX was not making them in the time of the prequel trilogy and doing the prequels last. The last three movies should have been about still relativy young and active Luke, Leia, and Han still hopefully working on something and not having them all decrepit people with broken dreams sitting mostly in the background while Team Degrassi Junior Jedi run around the galaxy.

[Jasmine]

I loved the movie. Like any other “wrap-up” movie, there are people who are going to hate it because the ending wasn’t the ending THEY wanted. I certainly give it 3 out of 4 stars. “The Empire Strikes Back”, from the original trilogy, is still my favorite, though.

[IvoryTowerDenizen]

@Swampwolf

I saw it last night and was sobbing through most of it. Not a tear trickling down my face, but full-on, shoulders shaking, sobbing. Partly for the feels within the movie, but a lot of it was that this was a movie I have been waiting for for more than 40 years. A constant presence throughout my life since I was 8 years old, always knowing “there will be more to come,” and now…done. (disclaimer: I know that as long as the Mouse can make money, there will always be more. But they’re not SW. They’re SW Universe)

I understand picking the new trilogy apart (in my house, we don’t talk about Eps. 1-3): the cheesiness, the parallels to 4-6, the plot holes, the unanswered questions. But as other posters have said, a lot of people hold the original trilogy up as perfection, and an example of all that is holy. They weren’t.

They weren’t ever supposed to be.

They were cheesy. They were inconsistent. They were formulaic. But they were fun. They told a good story. A simple, cliche-riddled tale of humble beginnings, a rise to power (for want of a better word), battle between good and evil against overwhelming odds (with the obligatory main character’s internal conflict) and the eventual triumph of the light over the dark.

These movies followed the same classic formula. (So did Eps 1-3, but they were just plain unwatchable, IMO) So I’m going to come to the defense of Rise of Skywalker and say that I loved it. Enough nods to the Originals: “Red 5 is in the air” was beautiful, as an acknowledgement that a legendary X-wing was still recognized, and the whiners can STFU, 'cos Chewy got his medal.

My take on it is that it ended the story. It ended well, the good guys won, and the trilogy of trilogies is complete.
[Kwiil]I have spoken.[/Kwiil]

Saw it last night and 100% this. Sobbed during the last 20 min. Every callback make me grin like an idiot (Ben: Struggling to say “I love you” to Han. Han: I know; Chewy FINALLY getting his medal). Was getting annoyed that after everything Rise of Skywalker was going to be about Ben, and it wasn’t! Was so pleased with the ending.

This franchise defined most of my life- I was 10 in 1977. Loved every minute of it, faults and all.

[Deeg]

I wasn’t as disappointed as I expected. It had it’s flaws but it had it’s good moments. It’s worth seeing if you’re a SW fan.

@DigitalC

It’s fine to say you just don’t like Star Wars, but if you are one of those people who think the originals are great and the new ones suck then the issue lies with you.

I couldn’t disagree more. The OT, while it has its flaws, also had originality coupled with a coherent story arc. The sequels have almost none. For example, ROS ends almost exactly the same ways as ROTJ: the hero dressed in white confronts Palpatine, who gives away his entire plan by monologuing. The hero is saved by Palpatine’s most powerful henchman–a Skywalker dressed in black–who has a change of heart near the end. Meanwhile what’s left of the rebel fleet is being decimated by the bad guys.

Where the sequels did have originality they often invalidated the SW universe, like the asinine Holdo Maneuver. Rogue One was a much better movie than any of the sequels.

[The_Other_Waldo_Pepper]

@Deeg

For example, ROS ends almost exactly the same ways as ROTJ: the hero dressed in white confronts Palpatine, who gives away his entire plan by monologuing. The hero is saved by Palpatine’s most powerful henchman–a Skywalker dressed in black

Dressed in white?

[Deeg]

Doh, you’re right. I’m conflating it with Luke’s first fight with Vader (when he loses his hand).

[iiandyiiii]

The Holdo maneuver did sort of break Star Wars space battles, but it was so incredible cool both in building and relieving tension and in visual/audio brilliance that I forgive it. Presumably some explanation can or has been made that retcons away the SW-breaking nature of it.

[Mahaloth]

Apparently, when they show the Ewoks at the end, you can see that the star destroyer up above their moon has been destroyed by “the Holdo maneuver”. So it got used again.

[dorvann]

Ian McDiarmid’s performance as Palpatine in the prequels is what I enjoyed most about the prequels.

That being said I think he(and the character) was wasted in Rise of Skywalker(ROS). Palpatine’s return should have been the focus of the whole sequel trilogy not just one movie. ROS felt like they tried cramming 2(Or 3) movies worth of plot into one film.(I did enjoy it though.)

It’s obvious there is not one creative force behind Star Wars and that each movie is written on its owns without any thought of where to develop the next film. I wonder where there go from here with the Star Wars franchise.

[Miller]

@Mahaloth

Apparently, when they show the Ewoks at the end, you can see that the star destroyer up above their moon has been destroyed by “the Holdo maneuver”. So it got used again.

How could you tell that was destroyed by the Holdo maneuver, and not conventional combat?

[Miller]

@Deeg

Doh, you’re right. I’m conflating it with Luke’s first fight with Vader (when he loses his hand).

Also not dressed in white.

[Half_Man_Half_Wit]

@Miller

How could you tell that was destroyed by the Holdo maneuver, and not conventional combat?

I do remember thinking that’s how it looked, too—sort of a whiteish glowing line bisecting the SD. I quickly resolved to ignore it.

[outlierrn]

@Munch

I know I’ve seen something really similar to the Emperor being suspended by a giant mechanical arm in the middle of an arena before. It is concept art from ROTJ, something from the EU, or something else? I mentioned it on Facebook, and a friend agreed they’d seen something similar as well. Maybe in a video game?

maybe you’re thinking of Spacehunter: Adventures in the Forbidden Zone

[outlierrn]

I give it a solid meh, better than TLJ, but nothing special.

[Mahaloth]

@Miller

How could you tell that was destroyed by the Holdo maneuver, and not conventional combat?

It looks cut in half.

[Left_Hand_of_Dorkness]

@FlikTheBlue

I always thought it was the giving into hatred rather than the actual killing that led to turning to the dark side. Presumably for Rey or Luke before her to successfully strike down old Sheev they would have had to use some kind of inner rage to have enough strength to strike successfully. A cool dispassionate attempt would have probably failed. On the other hand, if it was somehow possible to kill Palpatine without flying into a rage, that wouldn’t lead to falling to the dark side.

Yeah, I’m sure you’re right. I just find that a hilariously messed-up philosophy. Kill as many people as you’d like–even after you learn a lot of them were conscripted as children and want to escape–as long as you’re not angry when you kill them. But be angry enough about the Granddaddy of Genocide that you kill him? Oooh, dark side time!