The Hard Price Of Enduring Success?

Rating: 4/10 (1 February 2017)

Fan club eye candy.
(I don't think anything here can be considered a Spoiler as such, however, it is best read if you HAVE seen the film, NOT if you are intending to see it. If the latter, please "look away now".) It is not really a "stand alone" story line (as advertised) but presumes the audience has watched every-single-Star-Wars-film-ever-made.
Big mistake.
The need to tie in with later films severely handicapped both the character development and the plot.
Technically, brilliant, ground breaking.
Those who dedicated 18 months (and more) to CGI deserve every credit. Time and again, however, I felt cheated - "Wow, what a great scene!" - whoops, where has it gone? I was enjoying that but I'm rationed to one and a half seconds ("because every Star Wars Fan has seen something like that too often before"? I wonder).
Big disappointment with the music, sorry, it attacked rather than enhanced the imagery and narrative.
To me it felt like every creative input was handcuffed and manacled by the past, by the need to "live up" to something, to, "satisfy expectations".
The whole Star Wars concept is a most fantastic piece of modern science fiction.
"Star Wars" is to cinema what "Dune" was to literature.
I still love the original, first and, possibly, the best - but then, I've seen only a few.
Those historic and impeccable CGIs should, please, surely have featured, however briefly, right at the start.
The Chess Scene was one of the Great Moments in the original, that uniqueness, the Magic, simply cannot be recaptured. There is only ever one First Time. It could, however, be woven in as "part of everyday life" something with which we the viewers are presumed to be familiar. It is so brief, it serves as no more than a reference or a reminder.
The "guest appearances" of C-3PO & R2-D2 were for me too brief and lacked the, how can I put it, "red carpet" they deserved. I would like to have seen them for a few more moments at least.
I loved the peculiar aliens in their rocket machines, but again, Now You See Them Now You Don't, gone in the blink of an eye.
Those "Other Worlds", wonderful vistas, I wanted to gaze upon them and drink in the "Avatar-meets-Blade-Runner" landscapes but no, whoosh, they're whisked away before you can see the mountain tops.
Clearly, many fans love this prequel; the real test, to my mind, is how does it come across to Newbies? Perhaps that is as hard as finding an impartial jury for a world-famous crime (if you'll excuse the analogy).
The "Star Wars" epic-drama suffers (shock horror) from decades of astounding, hard-earned and much deserved success.
Long may the Force continue to bring us great screen moments.