Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker (J.J. Abrams, 2019)

[Michael Kerpan]

Disney sucks...

[ford]

It’s amusing to me how much the Last Jedi hate revolves around Luke’s story arc, which is seen as some hideous abomination concocted by a “maverick” Rian Johnson. Yet from everything we know, it’s pretty close to how Lucas planned it when he was prepping Episode VII shortly before the Disney sale: describing Luke as a “Col Kurtz” figure, and “haunted.” It’s also the logical next step from the last shot of TFA.

So basically, the executive decision to “undo” TLJ, a fantastic film, led to the hideous product Disney just released.

[movielocke]

Honestly if Luke did a bunch of attack of clones style cgi yoda super lightsaber moves at the end of the last Jedi there would never have been any fan backlash. That’s all the sad fans needed: reassurance he was still a star QB with sick video game moves.

One aspect I was most disappointed with is that for the first time the principle dialogue/onscreen villain was empowered at the end of last Jedi, with Kylie Ren becoming supreme leader. For the series finale we would finally have appropriately a story with no shadowy behind the scenes villain puppeteering the action the villain the audience loves to hate would finally be in charge.

That was an incredibly good idea that should have led the story and character in a lot of great potential directions, particularly thematically in regards how he would finally use power that neither he nor Vader has ever known and how that would probably lead to his own undoing.

Instead the literal first scene erases this and strips Ren of his authority and power again making him again just like Vader, the servant of a shadowy impotent villain.

[ford]

Honestly if Luke did a bunch of attack of clones style cgi yoda super lightsaber moves at the end of the last Jedi there would never have been any fan backlash. That’s all the sad fans needed: reassurance he was still a star QB with sick video game moves.

One aspect I was most disappointed with is that for the first time the principle dialogue/onscreen villain was empowered at the end of last Jedi, with Kylie Ren becoming supreme leader. For the series finale we would finally have appropriately a story with no shadowy behind the scenes villain puppeteering the action the villain the audience loves to hate would finally be in charge.

That was an incredibly good idea that should have led the story and character in a lot of great potential directions, particularly thematically in regards how he would finally use power that neither he nor Vader has ever known and how that would probably lead to his own undoing.

Instead the literal first scene erases this and strips Ren of his authority and power again making him again just like Vader, the servant of a shadowy impotent villain.

Yup. Well said.

[Brian C]

Bringing back Palpatine really is emblematic of the creative rot in this movie. They can't even be bothered to retrofit him into the storylines from the first two movies of this trilogy beyond a passing line about how he was behind Snoke. And actually, it's even worse than that - they can't even be bothered to come up with a storyline to fit him into this movie, so he's just dropped into the opening crawl so that we know he's around now, and off we go.

Am I wrong, or is this movie so carelessly plotted/assembled that it gives us 3 Sith wayfinders despite the explanation that only 2 were made? Also, I know it's folly to think about these things logically, but if the Sith planet is so unreachable, how is Palpatine able to assemble a galaxy-sized fleet of doom? I mean, where did all the fucking pilots for those ships come from?

I dunno. I don't have a huge emotional investment in Star Wars. But this one just seemed exceptionally lazy. It doesn't even rise to the level of fan service to me - it's more like the Austin Powers sequels, where the same bits are recycled over and over again. It feels downright hostile to me, like the shitty coworker in a group project that rolls their eyes whenever someone suggests doing more than the absolute minimum. People spent years of their lives making this, and yet the lack of effort - actually, contempt at the very idea of effort - is palpable.

[aox]

Bringing back Palpatine really is emblematic of the creative rot in this movie. They can't even be bothered to retrofit him into the storylines from the first two movies of this trilogy beyond a passing line about how he was behind Snoke. And actually, it's even worse than that - they can't even be bothered to come up with a storyline to fit him into this movie, so he's just dropped into the opening crawl so that we know he's around now, and off we go.

Am I wrong, or is this movie so carelessly plotted/assembled that it gives us 3 Sith wayfinders despite the explanation that only 2 were made? Also, I know it's folly to think about these things logically, but if the Sith planet is so unreachable, how is Palpatine able to assemble a galaxy-sized fleet of doom? I mean, where did all the fucking pilots for those ships come from?

I dunno. I don't have a huge emotional investment in Star Wars. But this one just seemed exceptionally lazy. It doesn't even rise to the level of fan service to me - it's more like the Austin Powers sequels, where the same bits are recycled over and over again. It feels downright hostile to me, like the shitty coworker in a group project that rolls their eyes whenever someone suggests doing more than the absolute minimum. People spent years of their lives making this, and yet the lack of effort - actually, contempt at the very idea of effort - is palpable.

Also, where have they been getting all of the titanium to make these star ships and death stars? That planet(s) must be ecologically fucked and knowing the Empire, the labor laws/protections must be atrocious. Forget unions.

[Brian C]

You joke (I think), but the impossibility of getting to the planet is a major plot point! So I feel it’s relevant. At least the impossible-to-find planet that Luke was on was deserted except for Luke.

[ford]

As Matt Christman of Chapo Trap House put it, Disney spent $500 million to tell Rian Johnson that he sucks.

[aox]

You joke (I think), but the impossibility of getting to the planet is a major plot point! So I feel it’s relevant. At least the impossible-to-find planet that Luke was on was deserted except for Luke.

I would argue with you... well, maybe agree with you, but I was kind of checked out by that point.

[Finch]

Those reddit reports quoted above are probably not going to be confirmed for a few years but they feel credible given the precedents set by Rogue One and Solo and the indiewire interview by the editor of Episode 9 where she says she had to do "mobile editing" on the set, and the report says they were still filming into October.

[Reverend Drewcifer]

I have a suspicion that Disney will clamp down on any "unofficial" versions of behind-the-scenes drama (my favorite kind). This is an organization with nearly 100 years of what my boss calls "burned skin memory cells," and there is a vested interest in keeping loose lips from sinking what will probably one day be a trillion dollar ship.

The viability of NDAs has been called into question, but that does not limit Disney from implementing a number of other legal instruments to suppress voices that disagree with or subvert their image. This goes beyond Star Wars. THE major non-animated economic dynamo of their motion picture division is only 12 or so years old, but 20+ movies in, and Disney has managed to keep the lid on all manor of backroom chatter, quelling dissent with expert PR and well placed and well timed press releases disguised as "news" on pop culture websites. Maybe someone like Edgar Wright or Patty Jenkins could slip samidzat news into the conversation, or maybe these are just genre films and Bob Iger isn't Nicolae Ceaușescu. However, Disney is not continuing the tradition of (relatively) illuminating Lucasfilm books beyond the usual picture-book fluff. J.W Rinzler on the cancellation of the Episode VII book:

“There was no chance that [The Making of Star Wars: The Force Awakens] book was going to be published. I knew when I started writing it that it would be cancelled... there were a lot of things that were known to the public that I think Disney and Kathleen Kennedy just didn't want to rehash. This is just speculation on my part, but even stuff like changing the date of the release, that Brad Bird was approached first, that Harrison Ford was almost killed… they were not comfortable with the book rehashing those issues.”

We'll never see Gareth Edwards' Rogue One, nor know exactly the blow-by-blow on Solo. Any and all current speculation on Episode IX will remain speculation until one of the major players slips up in an interview or crafts a delicious blind item. As an eager consumer of information on the business and creative decision-making process, Disney is a grim brick wall with a smiley face painted on.

[jbeall]

I'm one of those people who loved The Last Jedi, but my complaint has almost nothing to do with how Abrams basically tried to bury episode VIII with this trash.

Rather, my problem with Rise of Skywalker, even while I was watching it, is that the movie makes me think that Kathleen Kennedy sat down with Abrams and said, "You know what, JJ? The Force Awakens was great, but it could've used more fan service!"

What resulted is... well, it's like when a band that put out some great stuff years ago gets hired to play the Super Bowl halftime show, and they rush so robotically through a medley of their greatest hits that you actually feel embarrassed for them, and embarrassed that you were ever invested in the material to begin with. Rise of Skywalker is the Super Bowl halftime medley of the Star Wars universe.

[kcota17]

Surprised no one has brought up one of the worst moments and laziest cop outs in the franchises’ history:

SpoilerShow

And that is Palpatine having a vat of Snokes swimming around in his lair.

[Brian C]

Huh what? I didn’t notice anything like that. But honestly I kinda like the idea.

The worst moment in the series history is actually “I’m the spy!”

[therewillbeblus]

The worst moment in the series history is actually “I’m the spy!”

That was dumb but the even sillier response for the rationale made me laugh for being even more dumb and a reference (conscious or unconscious) to American responses to the 2016 election, when the spy defensively says they weren’t on the side of the rebels but against their leader. I can’t count how many people I’ve come across since, whether they voted for Hillary or Trump, who say they didn’t endorse the candidate they voted for but based their vote around being “against [enter opposing candidate].” Abrams seemed to be poking fun at that mentally and stance that divorces itself from accountability behind a choice through separation from that group; superiority in individualism and hypocritically diffusing responsibility even after participating in a group-centered process. Maybe I’m reaching but either way it hit the perfect mark in art-imitates-life, only because of how god awful it was though.

[jbeall]

I thought the worst moment was

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Chewie was on the OTHER transport!

But the movie is so full of lazy writing and dumbass plot contrivances that it's only somewhere in the top ten.

[Roger Ryan]

Surprised no one has brought up one of the worst moments and laziest cop outs in the franchises’ history:

SpoilerShow

And that is Palpatine having a vat of Snokes swimming around in his lair.

And the image immediately reminded me of Alien: Resurrection in which the scientists have a storage room of failed cloning experiments.

Given the conceit of the serial format, only the original film (A New Hope) could get away with dropping the viewer in the middle of a story (which I always thought was the first film's cleverest idea, being a great way to dispense with burdensome exposition). "Episode IX", on the other hand, should pick-up the story directly from the end of "Episode VIII". As pointed out by others, the inexplicable return of Palpatine and everything he and his associates have been doing for thirty years or more is too important to happen off-screen between episodes. That aspect of the story deserves its own episode/film for it to have any hope of being able to "play" logically into what The Rise of Skywalker is trying to do. That the opening "recap" crawl and about two minutes of screen-time attempts to shoehorn in a complete left-turn in plotting derails "Episode IX" immediately, and it never recovers. The film's successive cheats and illogical twists just add insult to the injury.

[ford]

From a new interview with the film's editor.

“We were definitely still trying to figure out a lot of stuff,” Brandon said about the sped-up editing process. “It’s a struggle. It affected everything. About a third of the way through, [Lucasfilm president] Kathy [Kennedy] was like, ‘JJ has got to spend more time in the cutting room.’ And I knew that wasn’t going to happen. Not with the schedule that we were on. Not with what he was dealing with on a daily basis…he was just exhausted at the end of the day.”

[RIP Film]

I don’t disagree with any of these criticisms, but I also kind of wonder: what were you guys expecting? The groundwork and shallow aims of this trilogy were basically laid out in the first film. Maybe it’s because my expectations were abject (and I fully expected J.J. to ape Return of the Jedi), but I didn’t walk out of this as disappointed as with the first two.

SpoilerShow

Bringing back Palpatine is indeed a sign of Disney’s creative bankruptcy, but dare I say, it threw this trilogy a lifesaver in terms of overall logic. Making it so that Palpatine was basically the voice in Ben’s head, like some sort of tumor pressing against the amygdala, is a passable explanation for his hitherto illogical reasons for turning to the dark side and idolizing Vader. And as much as Rey’s real identity felt shoehorned in, they could have done far worse.

People here seem to be making The Last Jedi out to be better than it was... That movie had just as many goofy-isms as this one, such as: sociopathic Poe, respawning Leia, Luke doing force facetime across galaxies, badly choreographed fight scenes, and just tonality issues in general. I will say that Johnson’s aims were a whole lot more interesting, and I appreciated his willingness to tell a quieter story over the almost moronic bombast that Abrams always opts for (“What if we had a billion star destroyers and they could all blow up planets??”).

But within the juvenile framework, I was able to enjoy it for what it was. Particularly in regard to its characters.

[solaris72]

Surprised no one has brought up one of the worst moments and laziest cop outs in the franchises’ history:

SpoilerShow

And that is Palpatine having a vat of Snokes swimming around in his lair.

Yeah that was especially awful.

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What was he going to use the other Snokes for?

Maybe they'll reappear in episode 15...

[aox]

Thoughts on this?

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Reddit

[soundchaser]

SpoilerShow

While it sure sounds like it would be a better film, I'm not sure it would be a good one. And JJ's insistence at retconning The Last Jedi would rankle no matter what. Of course, we have no proof for any of this, so I'd still take the claims with a heaping helping of salt.

[Roger Ryan]

Thoughts on this?

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Reddit

The whole "it's okay to release a weak film as long as it destroys Abrams' reputation so Warner Brothers won't hire him" seems like baseless speculation. However, some of the details regarding deleted footage/ideas seem to be borne out by lapses in the released film. The one detail that jumped out at me...

SpoilerShow

...was the reveal that Lando Calrissian was established as Jannah's father in an earlier cut. This would have given their final exchange a whole different meaning, and I'm surprised this information wasn't kept in the film. As it is, the impression the viewer gets is that the 80-year-old Lando is hitting on this young women!

[movielocke]

Thoughts on this?

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Reddit

Thanks for the link, very interesting to read, it definitely felt like a three hour movie severely cut down.

[Reverend Drewcifer]

I guess I didn't bank on Reddit as a source of tea spillage in my previous post. If even ~10% of those bullet points are true, then the behind-the-scenes stories on this will be the gift that keeps on giving. A post on the Blank Check Podcast says it best "[RoS] is already on it’s way to being a movie seemingly made by no one." Note to Disney: don't stop the press tour, I haven't popped the popcorn yet!