Sorry - But Its a Disaster (Caps a Terrible Trilogy)

Rating: Null/10 (27 December 2019)

One cannot talk about Rise of Skywalker without talking about the two films that preceded it. Unlike the old trilogy, the new trilogy did not have the benefit of starting out with a firm foundation. While there are some people that have argued that the Force Awakens was decent and Last Jedi was the film where the cracks started to show, I don't subscribe to this view. Force Awakens was the film that laid the foundation for the rest of the trilogy, with characters with almost no background (such as Rey and Finn), crazy and unbelievable coincidences (the Millennium Falcon conveniently appearing when Rey and Finn are in danger), and the so-called "failed" Luke character (as Han Solo said: "Luke felt responsible. He just walked away from everything"). Although Rian Johnson, I suppose, was not obligated to follow what Force Awakes set up (example: he could have ignored Han Solo's dialogue and ascribed Luke's disappearance to him needing to reassess and revise the Jedi teachings; he could still have thrown away the lightsaber but said something like "weapons of war are useless if your heart is not in the right place"), Force Awakens did set it up, and Rian Johnson did what he could with what was given to him. Moreover, with regards to the scene that shows Luke contemplating killing his nephew, that is already is being retconned in the comic books that a dark storm (possibly Palpatine) was in that room causing Luke to draw his lightsaber and maybe Rian Johnson, had he directed the third film, would have provided this explanation. Therefore, yes I guess I'm arguing that Last Jedi is a better movie than Force Awakens (not that Last Jedi is perfect by any means).
Now with Rise of Skywalker, JJ Abrams comes back to the trilogy that he started. And how does he conclude this saga? By once again having unbelievable coincidences and half-explained plot points. Why is the Emperor back? I guess the screenwriters couldn't decide whether it was Darth Plagueis' ability to bring people from the dead or cloning (note: if its a Palpatine clone, then why does Palpatine have the same scars?). Snoke is a clone, without an additional explanation, and we are back to having people have a genetic inheritance to dark villains. The latter is not only repetitive and boring but destroys the point that Rian Johnson made with Last Jedi that democratizes the force, which imo is a better and cooler point and would have emphasized the fact that for Star Wars to survive it has to go beyond the Skywalkers.
The movie does not add anything new to Star Wars. It merely xeroxes the old trilogy while essentially making the old trilogy pointless. In doing so, the new trilogy essentially destroys the legacy of the old films (although George Lucas was already doing that by changing scenes like replacing old Anakin Skywalker with new Anakin Skywalker in ROTJ - probably one of the most egregious changes of the Special Edition - worse than Greedo) and leaves us with characters that are paper thin, annoying (Finn for sure), useless (Poe), and boring. I don't care to follow them in future movies. Not the way that the new trilogy has disrespected the old trilogy characters, by not giving them their proper send-off, clumsily introducing new characters, and essentially making the old trilogy pointless. What's the point? I'm sorry but Star Wars is dead (maybe if they remake the new trilogy it could survive - maybe).