A disappointing conclusion to the Skywalker saga.

Rating: 5/10 (28 December 2019)

I had no expectations for Episode IX after The Last Jedi wrote J.J. Abrams into a corner, but somehow The Rise of Skywalker still managed to disappoint. It doesn't feel like an epic finale to a trilogy. Most of all, it's because we hardly got to know these characters. This makes it hard to care about the constant action sequences and elaborate set pieces that take up most of the film, and even harder to care about the new characters that are inexplicably introduced.
The plot is essentially a scavenger hunt with our heroes having to find a MacGuffin that leads to another MacGuffin to lead to some place so they can find another thing, etc. It's complete filler. Should this be what takes up the majority of the NINTH AND FINAL film in a franchise?
The only interesting aspects of the film are between Rey and Kylo Ren. They have been the driving force of this trilogy - their conflict and struggle between the light and dark side is something Star Wars has rarely explored, and it was a fresh new angle to take. Here, Kylo is given a hackneyed redemption arc and Rey chooses the light side over the dark with no inner conflict or emotional stakes whatsoever. I'd complain about how contrived it is, but at least it's something.
Poe, Finn, Chewbacca, C3P0, and basically every other character have nothing to do. They just tag along with Rey, bickering and talking over each other, contributing zero to the plot. It's like there's no time to breathe in any given scene. Either there's an over-elaborate action sequence with shooting and explosions, or there's character scenes of Rey, Poe, and Finn yelling over each other and C3P0 providing "comic relief". It's constantly loud and abrasive, and the pace moves so fast that it feels like an assault on the senses.
Palpatine is back, unfortunately, and he's dumber than ever. Nothing about his master plan makes sense. The stakes are comically over-the-top; Palpatine wants a fleet of Star Destroyers with Death Star lasers to blow up every planet in the universe because... why? He really wants Rey to strike him down and take his place as the leader of the Sith, but he also bribes Kylo with the enormous fleet of Star Destroyers so he can have ultimate power, yet he also wants Kylo to kill Rey because... why? (Also, it's curious that he goes by Palpatine and not his Sith name, Darth Sidious, which always bothered me and goes to show how much the writers cared about Star Wars lore). He wants to Rey to kill him but he puts up a fight against her because... why?
I'm sure there are throwaway lines or answers in the novelization excusing some of these plot holes, but it doesn't excuse the sloppy writing in the film. They had 2 and a half hours to write a coherent film, and they made it as noisy and incoherent as possible. It's a bloated mess and quite possibly the worst film in the franchise.
Well, maybe not the worst, but certainly the most exhausting.