I have always been eager to see the Star Wars films in a cinema. I do not really consider myself a Star Wars fanatic but only in the cinema will the spectacle fully come to life with a large screen and appropriate sound system. The story and the special effects will take you into worlds never seen before. The music by John Williams has always been a beautiful component of imminent quality of the films. And while John Williams still does a great job in The Rise Of Skywalker, I have to be brutally honest in saying this film is the worst of them all. And that is all due to a very poor story.
When George Lucas did his first two trilogies, he put in a lot of effort to get the stories to work. He wrote for years before he would commit to a locked script that would then be filmed. His two trilogies worked very well with regards to story logic and in the way of cause and effect. Lucas was able to completely explain why and how Annakin Skywalker became Darth Vader and how he came under the influence of the Emperor. His stories also explain how it is possible for the Emperor to have such vast armies by way of cloning.
The first cardinal sin of The Rise Of Skywalker is that cloning is now used as an excuse to explain how the Emperor, who was seen falling to his death in RETURN OF THE JEDI, is now again very much alive. The person, who we saw die, was apparently not really the Emperor and this is explained in a very shoddy and iffy way by no one in particular. Well, I don't think this is the mark of good writing as this fact is simply thrust upon the audience in the opening lines without having had the main characters have the opportunity to find this out on their own. Storywise The Rise Of Skywalker is nothing but a series of moments, some good, some bad, that race from one to the next without any seeming logic or narrative thread. What we see looks very good but the story simply makes no sense whatsoever.
There are some good moments (nice to see Lando Calrissian looking so good for his age) and the appearance of Harrison Ford as Han Solo was a very welcome one but it still does very little to make me feel for Kylo Ren/Ben Solo. Also, what we have seen before does not really make the storyline where Kylo Ren becomes simple Ben Solo again very credible. Had this been done over a few hours, that might have worked better but because this film had to make so many points in only 2 hours and some minutes, the film is simply overburdened with moments that hardly seem connected.
And where the Kylo becomes Ben storyline might seem interesting, I did not find it at all necessary to see Leia Organa die. There are more moments like this that for me do not really work but in the end, all you have is a film consisting of moments that do not really connect with me as the audience. I did enjoy the last scene where Rey buries the lightsabers on Tatooine and told my grandson, with whom I had gone to see the film, that in 30 years or so those would be found again, to start a new trilogy. But if I then think again, what have we seen here, I can only say that J.J. Abrams fails to deliver a good script as a base for a pleasing film.
Alas, I also thought Star Wars The Force Awakens was unoriginal (it did nothing new) and that The Last Jedi was partially incompatible with what we had seen before and therefor wholly divisive amongst the fans. With The Rise Of Skywalker also failing hard to bring us what previously George Lucas had always done, bring a good dramatic storyline, I can only say my final conclusion is that everything that came after Lucas sold off the franchise to Disney sucks bigtime! In my opinion, GEORGE LUCAS SHOULD NEVER HAVE SOLD OFF THE FRANCHISE !
George Lucas
J.J. Abrams
