The new canon books do touch on this, although its post ROTJ.
I’m gonna write my full review for Episode 9 tomorrow, but I have total apathy for Star Wars right now. That movie was a solid C. Better than Episode 8, but just so meh.
TROS Review
[spoiler]As I said in my previous post, this movie was a solid C for me. I didn’t hate it, didn’t love it, it was just average.
I think this movie suffered immensely from Kathleen Kennedy hiring and firing yet another director, bringing JJ and Chris Terrio in relatively late into the piece. Additionally, giving directors and writers relatively free reign (with some canon guidance from Lucas Story Group) has prevented any chance of the sequel trilogy from having a cohesive story.
After watching Rise of Skywalker, Last Jedi stands out like a sore thumb even more now. All the promising work done in Force Awakens with new character introductions, mysteries and potential story arcs were abruptly ended in the Last Jedi. Rian Johnson said he wanted all those characters and the various arcs to go the complete opposite way to how everybody assumed or speculated. I understand the need for new, fresh and sometimes shocking ideas, but they have to feel natural to the overall story. You also need to leave something and build on it for the next and final movie of the trilogy. The Last Jedi reminds me of The Walking Dead tv show. It starts off interesting, but eventually they kill off all developed characters and their associated story lines, leaving you with a bunch or characters and arcs you care very little for.
Episode 9 was left with the impossible task of introducing new arcs and characters and concluding these arcs all in the one movie. It didn’t help that Carrie Fisher who was meant to be more prominent in the film, died unexpectedly. It also doesn’t help when you fire the director as shooting is about to begin. Ian McDiarmid said he was only contacted about being in the movie 12 months ago, and JJ says he was still editing in November. The whole approach to the sequel trilogy has been haphazard and this has been reflected none more so than in this movie.
The first hour or so of the movie is just jumping from scene to scene, planet to planet, explosion to explosion. It was like Michael Bay had been given the directors chair for a Star Wars movie. There was so little dialogue or story building. The Emperor is suddenly back with little explanation (see previous paragraph). Hux is suddenly a mole, Leias death was chucked in as well. Her death had no emotional impact on me, despite her being one of my favourite characters. However, I do understand that Leias involvement was challenging, There was just no time to build up to these things because there was 140 minutes of explosions and dog fighting. Star Wars isn’t Marvel. It needs more than that. It has heart, it has drama.
After reading reviews, I thought the fan service was going to be over the top and cringe worthy, but it wasn’t anywhere near as bad as I had assumed. There has also been some talk about JJ retconing The Last Jedi, but I didn’t really find that either. Reys lineage was more of a twisting, rather than ignoring. However, the whole Anakin chosen one prophecy has been completely thrown out the window.
I expected an extremely safe movie after the reviews of the Last Jedi. But what I got was a rushed edit of a film that was patched together and left us with the same conclusion as Return of the Jedi. One day there will be a book published about the behind the scenes stuff for the Sequel trilogy. I cant wait to read it.
My new rankings list is below. Some of the movies are on pretty equal footing for me, but some stand out and some are an abomination. Interestingly, I think I find the prequels and sequels to be a complete polar opposite. The prequels had some horrible acting and jaring CGI, but the sequels had some great acting and CGI. However, the story and plot are more important for me, and the prequels smash the sequels out of the park. In time, the sequels may improve with age. The prequels themselves seem to be much more appreciated than their original release.
- Empire Strikes Back
2,3 & 4 fairly even
- Return of the Jedi
- A New Hope
- Revenge of the Sith
5-8 all pretty even
- The Phantom Menace
- Attack of the Clones
- Rogue One
- The Force Awakens
9 & 10 pretty even.
- Han Solo
- Rise of Skywalker
Dead last.
- The Last Jedi[/spoiler]
You’re allowed to rank Star Wars’s?
For me it’s:
1)The first one
2)The Last Jedi
:gap:
3)The Force Awakens
4)Empire Strikes Back
:gap:
5)Return of the Jedi
6)Episode 1
:BIG gap:
7)Episode 3, maybe? I dunno they’re getting pretty rough at this point…
8)Solo
9)Rogue One
10)Episode 2
I haven’t seen the most recent one yet, but if it’s a fairly “by the numbers” Star War with a lot of action and splosions you might compare it to Return of the Jedi? Which means the original trilogy had two good ones and ended with a not so great one. And the newest trilogy had two good ones and ended with a not so great one. Man! Their commitment to replicating the original trilogy is so meta!
I’m always surprised by how low Rogue 1 gets ranked by basically anyone or anything that ranks the movies. And to have it below Solo is perplexing.
Rogue One is probably the best piece of story telling in the whole franchise. Yes, it uses standard action/adventure tropes, but it builds tension better than any other movie in the universe.
And you know what the outcome of it’s story is going in …
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Really? I thought I was the only one that really didn’t like it.
Look - there’s not much in it, but Solo at least had Donald Glover as Lando - Rogue One had that knock off Darth Vader. It about sums up the two movies for me.
I thought Vader in Rogue One was excellent. I’ve always wanted to see peak vader, slaughtering anybody in his way.
Rogue One is the best Disney film for me, but even that struggled with pacing in the first 30min.
Haha yeah, I mean it’s ok to be wrong about things. That’s how we learn.
Also that movie got my hopes up by having Donnie Yen in it and squandered him and I can’t forgive it 
Rogue One might be my favourite of them all tbh, which is really saying a lot considering the apparent troubles they had re the re-shoots, not to mention you know exactly what happens and how it ends. That they turned that into a strength of the film is pretty cool tbh.
I also think my mixed feelings on TROS amplify how good TLJ was. I loved the way the characters grew, and the Rey/Kylo connection it introduced was the best invention across the whole saga. Those two are easily the most nuanced and interesting characters in the films imo, and that was something that didn’t disappoint in TROS (though the kiss was naff).
The Palpatine reveal just didn’t feel earned at all tbh. Sure, having him survive and be the overall big bad I can just about handle, but him being Rey’s grandfather doesn’t work for me. The two characters have zero connection in prior stories, so it falls really flat. Vader revealing himself as Luke’s father had tonnes more gravity given their prior interactions, and Luke having been told that Vader actually murdered his father (true, from a certain point of view).
Plus Sheev having a kid just hanging out somewhere unbeknownst to anyone is strange.
There was a lot to like about TROS, and it did genuinely stir the cockles on more than one occasion, but I felt detached from it from the Palpatine reveal onwards tbh.
The Leia stuff was fine, and I sympathise with them re: the whole situation, especially given she was going to have an even greater role originally. Would have been nice to have her training Rey a little more intently but they did as well as can be expected.
Rose being almost written out of it was weird. Dominic Monaghan being in it almost as an extra also weird.
Loved Chewy getting a medal for the lols.
Keen to see it again so I can take more in - the pacing is overly manic for large parts.
I really don’t get why people think this is a problem.
I don’t need to be surprised by the ending of a film. You can even remake an old film that I’ve seen before and it can be as good or better than the original.
I’m not sure I’ve ever been unsure about the ending of a Star Wars movie.
What specifically didnt you like about Vader? He wasnt in it that much, bar that awesome corridor scene.
It’s been a while. I don’t remember any corridor scene, but I remember he has the other bad guy brought before him (how they do) and hes just totally unconvincing. Not menacing or cool in the slightest. He just kind of wouldn’t shut up.
And more than anything it just didn’t need him. It epitomised the slavish devotion to the call back that this series suffers from- sometimes it works (rarely) but this, to me, was an example of it really not.
Edit: ho boy. I just YouTubed it and it’s worse than I remember. It’s almost parody. “Be careful not to choke on your aspirations my man…” 
Geddit? Choke? Like the thing Darth Vader did in that old movie? Jesus.
I saw the new one today. No spoilers, but I thought it was better than some of the reviews I’ve seen are saying. Not perfect but ultimately fine.
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It’s probably as good as it can be given it’s Disney and it had to clean up the mess that was VIII.
Lots packed in there so will need a few more viewings.
9 is a mess.
8 wasn’t a mess. It was a shit story told poorly.
Go to bed hilly
“It felt like I was watching a hand sewn patchwork quilt made by an extremely talented, dementia riddled grandmother.”
Just watched ROS.
It can get in the bin.
The use of Palpatine at all in this movie marked it down quite a bit. Unnecessary, and detracts a bit from Kylo vs Rey or Kylo + Rey built up throughout the new trilogy.
I also thought the first half an hour was too chaotic and fast-paced. I had a real bad feeling about the movie from that first half an hour but for me, it did improve as the movie went on.
Plenty of fan service as well, but really nothing surprising there.
[spoiler]It was alright but it did feel a bit rushed, especially at the start. I’m just glad this arc of movies has been wrapped up and now they can focus on standalone projects like Rogue One, Solo and the Mandalorian.
Rose getting relegated to glorified extra was rather galling. I was a bit indifferent about her character in TLJ but given the amount of harassment and garbage Kelly Marie Tran copped online from fans after its release, this felt like the producers were almost endorsing what happened to her.
That moment between Lando and Jannah at the end was awkward AF. Either their edited out material suggesting Lando was her father or he still thinks he’s a ladies man.
If you’re bringing back Wedge Antillies, give him more than two seconds of screentime.
Knights of Ren were all show and no go, disappointing how easily they got their arses kicked in the end.
Pig-faced horses running along the deck of a Star Destroyer…errrrr nope.
The highlight of the movie for me was the scoring by John Williams. The throne room theme from ROTJ was perfectly timed and I loved how at the very end Rei’s theme evolved into the Skywalker theme to reflect her choice.[/spoiler]