Supremely Entertaining, If A Bit Rushed/Overburdened

Rating: 8/10 (29 December 2019)

Walking out of the theater after seeing "The Rise of Skywalker", I was almost giddy with happiness. J.J. Abrams had brought Star Wars back after the failure of "The Last Jedi"! After a week of letting the film percolate in my mind a bit and reading some other thoughts/reviews, the film has settled downward a bit. It is so supremely entertaining that I would never give it a lower rating than 8/10 stars, but at the same time it is so jam-packed with things to accomplish that there just isn't time to let all the material play out as it should. That, more than any specific writing/character decision, is why I have to drop it down a few stars from the "solid 10" I gave it as the credits rolled.
For a very basic overview, "The Rise of Skywalker" sees the return of an old, thought to be long-dead antagonist in the form of the Sith Emperor Palpatine (Ian McDiarmid). After first being visited by Kylo Ren (Adam Driver), eventually the heroes of the new trilogy--Rey (Daisey Ridley), Finn (John Boyega), Poe (Oscar Isaac)--pick up the scent and must try to snuff out this new threat that could represent the end of the Resistance.
Plot-wise, there is very little I disagreed with in this film. It's a rousing adventure, to be sure, and a fitting end to the nine-movie saga. I especially enjoyed the cultivation of the notion that one's bloodline does not represent who they are in the Star Wars universe anymore, and that's a concept I really like (especially how it mirrors the end of the overall saga). When Rey disavows her Palpatine heritage and declares herself a Skywalker of her own accord, that seems to be the moment the entire third trilogy was building toward.
That being said, once the initial excitement of the theater experience wore off, I found there to be some issues with the way certain points were handled. A few examples:
-The Palpatine character was rushed...plain and simple. What could have been an epic tease falls a little flat in the execution, especially when he is introduced in the opening crawl rather than at some point later on where his presence could truly be appreciated.
-Besides the beginning and the end of the picture, Driver's Ren is only a bit player in the proceedings. One could argue him being the most unique character to come from this entire trilogy, so it was a bit odd to see him cast aside for much of its conclusion.
-Rey's final confrontation with the Emperor even feels a bit underdone in execution. How epic would it have been to have seen some Force-ghosts of, say, Annakin, Obi-Wan, Qui-Gonn, or Yoda instead of just hearing their voices? The same could even be said for Palpatine's Sith background. Nothing wrong with the overall concept, but that moment could have been so much more.
Of course, it certainly doesn't help that this film spends a good deal of its time course-correcting after the embarrassment that was "The Last Jedi". That second film of this trilogy may have had some interesting ideas, to be sure, but director Rian Johnson had absolutely no idea how to execute them. Because of this, much of the pleasure here is seeing how they subtly (or sometimes not-so-subtly) get the franchise back to more traditional Star Wars fare (the approach I tend to enjoy in these films). When ghost-Luke tells Rey "that is no way to treat a Jedi weapon", I almost stood and applauded. Unfortunately, it just isn't good practice in any trilogy to have such wild swings in tone. I truly feel like having one director (JJ or otherwise) all the way through would have been a much better choice.
So, I guess my final word (at least at the moment) on "Rise of Skywalker" is this: it absolutely thrilled me as I sat in my theater seat, so that counts for something. The action/adventure was thrilling, the character/plot decisions were fine, and I very much enjoyed the overall message trying to be conveyed. At the same time, it was burdened by the weight of it's predecessor, the weight of trying to put an amen to the most culturally-known film franchise perhaps of all-time, and the weight of a fast-tracked production schedule. Oh yeah, and the legacy character (Princess Leia) they originally wanted to build the whole thing around? Sadly, Carrie Fisher passed before that could become a reality. In hindsight, I wonder if delaying this film by, say, a year would have produced a slightly better result?
Through all this, I settled on 8 stars because I gave 9 to "The Force Awakens" and still consider that one the best of the contemporary trilogy. "Rise" (thanks to Abrams) captures much of that film's energy, but it isn't as free to pursue it in the most open, creative way possible. In terms of trilogy-enders, "Rise" is a bit behind "Return of the Jedi" and "Revenge of the Sith".