Thankfully the end

Rating: 4/10 (28 December 2019)

I saw the first Star Wars film (A New Hope) under duress when I worked as an usherette in a cinema, and consequently saw it over 300 times. Even at that time as a non-fan, I was impressed with the story, effects, and set pieces and got hooked into the series by default.
After watching The Rise of Skywalker I now feel they should have stopped the series at Return of the Jedi when it was on a high and was a complete concept. I can't fault the acting or the special effects but the story was too thin with too many 'cut and paste' scenes from previous films, I spent a lot of time saying "that bit was out of...".
It was far too long and I actually nodded off halfway through. Unfortunately there has been a thorough Disneyfication of the franchise now, and it was just like any other Disney film; I could see the Ren/Rey kiss coming and was inwardly pleading for it not to happen, it was cringeworthy.
Don't get your hopes up with this one, but if you are happy to disregard all other Star Wars films and can tolerate its inconsistencies with the back catalogue, you might enjoy it.