Rise of Skywalker | ROSS HARRISON

Continuing my fine tradition of filling my author blog with ramblings about films, here’s some ramblings about the ninth and final (until Disney wants to cash in again) film in the Skywalker saga.

I won’t be writing too much about it for now, as I haven’t had time for it all to sink in (and I left the cinema actually liking The Last Jedi, so I’ve learned to think for longer before giving much of an opinion). So there won’t be spoilers.

JJ Abrams was left with an absolute mess to try to tidy up and bring into order in just one film, whilst simultaneously delivering a finale to a more than forty-year-old saga. He did okay. He could have done better in some areas, but he could have done a lot worse. It seems like he went into it with the resolution to just ignore TLJ where he could and flippantly dismiss it where he couldn’t ignore it. This resulted in a film that didn’t entirely feel like it was a follow on, but did feel like a return to what the trilogy was originally supposed to be.

The downside to this is that it seems painfully obvious that Emperor Palpatine was never meant to return, and only did so because a certain director wanted so desperately to ‘subvert expectations’ that he off’d the main villain without thought for the next writers and director. Sidious does little and never feels like a threat. If anything, it weakens his character overall to have him back just for this.

Because of the time jump between the two films, Rey has actually had time to train and learn from the Jedi texts, so when she uses the Force, it actually seems like she has done something to earn it, and it makes sense. This is welcome departure from how, in The Force Awakens, she goes from not knowing for sure that the Jedi are real to suddenly doing a Jedi Mind Trick on James Bond out of nowhere. Revelations regarding her are a little weak and predictable, but I would almost say that doesn’t matter if it weren’t for the fact that it is at the core of the story. She is less two-dimensional this time, and actually feels more like she is driving the story rather than just sitting in for the ride while stuff happens.

There were more surprises in terms of what wasn’t in the film that what was. Expected scenes, characters, and lines not being there was a minor disappointment, but by the end of the film, any unanswered questions and issues I had were mild and pretty unimportant. Only one thing happened that I was certain I did not want to happen, and that will remain a black mark on the film/trilogy. But it wasn’t enough to make me unhappy with the film overall. And, for me, the final line in the film is perfect (even if the character it’s delivered to makes no sense).

So, while I need to think about it more to really form an opinion, I think overall the trilogy and the saga ended pretty well. You could say it rises to the occasion…if you want people to roll their eyes at you. Not as well as Star Wars deserves, but well enough.

(EDIT: My brain was obviously thinking about it while I slept, because I woke up with a lot more questions starting with ‘why the hell’. A lot more issues came to mind, and things that happened just for story convenience, typical Abrams style. But nothing (yet) has changed my mind overall.)

Also my book is out, so…there’s my authorly duty.

I didn’t intend to stay up until 3am to watch the new Star Wars trailer, but when Twitter was full of ‘only 2 minutes until the trailer’ for an hour, it just happened. And it was good. Ticket sales already beat out everything including Endgame (although they opened at a more reasonable time of day than Endgame’s, so there’s that), and The Last Jedi -prompted boycott of Star Wars seems to be going well…

Rey exudes a goodness that can’t be turned to the Dark side, Kylo Ren still looks like a moody teenager with an unstable lightsaber, and the others are also there. C-3PO’s line is beaten by Carrie Fisher’s single word as the biggest punch to the heart, and Po says some stuff also.

The Last Jedi was bad. Objectively, bad film-makingly bad as well as subjectively, bad writingly bad. Rian Johnson’s need to ‘subvert expectations’ at any cost subverted our expectations of a great Star Wars film and left many hurdles for JJ Abrams to clamber over. There’s no telling if he is up to it. Force Awakens was very good (I thought), but not without its own problems. Not least of all R2D2 waking up at the end just…because. Abrams couldn’t be bothered to think up an actual reason for it, so it just happened out of convenience. That kind of lazy writing will not save this trilogy, so who knows. I look forward to it, anyway.

Aside from the unknowable issues that may arise in the film, there are only two things I know for sure I don’t want to happen. I don’t want Rey to turn to the Dark side, and I don’t want the teen girl ‘Reylo’ obsession to come about. Both would be awful writing, and the former would be insulting to the other characters and to the whole ‘I won’t be the last Jedi’ thing.

But the latter would be real-world problematic. Kylo Ren is a mass murderer. He killed Han Solo, whom I argue became a surrogate father of sorts to Rey in the short time they were together in TFA. He tortured Po. He abducted Rey, invaded her mind, tried to kill her. He emotionally abuses her. And that’s the issue. Kylo Ren is Rey’s abuser. Disney wants this trilogy to appeal to a younger, female audience. ‘Shipping’ ‘Reylo’, as the young, hip people say, and the message of ‘sure, he’s your literal abuser, but he’s troubled and you liked him without his shirt, so it’s fine’ would be extremely problematic and irresponsible far beyond the fictional world.

Also, you heard it here first: Palpatine stole Anakin’s body and fused it to AT-ST legs and now they are a zombified horror. Definitely, no question.