Rise of the flaws

Rating: 8/10 (10 April 2020)

Like The Last Jedi, this one seemed to divide fans, but not quite as much, as it seems to have gotten more hate. Though those that did hate it, really hated it, while those that liked it, really did seem to like it. Obviously, I was one of the ones who enjoyed it, but it did have its share of flaws. In fact, I'd even say out of all nine films, this one I had the most issues with, but I ranking movies on how much I enjoyed them, despite their flaws.
As far as complaints go, one of the biggest complaints about this movie seemed to be about bringing back Palpatine. While I didn't have a problem with it, per say, I do kind of wish that they had done something else. Vader killing him back in Jedi seemed like the perfect end for him, and to suddenly and randomly bring him back like this and say he was behind everything felt a little too out of the blue, like there should have been more to this than simply telling us, "Hey, guess what, Palpatine's back" in the scroll text. Even if they had, I still think a different final villain may have been better. Like what if it had been Darth Plagueis instead. Maybe Palpatine only thought he had killed him, but Plagueis, in his knowledge and quest to cheat death, had a failsafe in case he ever did die, and then they did the same thing that they did with Palpatine, just with him instead. But I was content enough with what they did do, even if I had preferred that his original death had been the end of him. Him having a cloned body for himself hidden away that he transferred his spirit into along with the spirit of every Sith before him was acceptable to me, especially since he had done this before in other Star Wars media.
I also wasn't an overall fan of the so-called treasure hunt for the wayfinder. It didn't feel like a Star Wars theme, more of an Indiana Jones one. I could accept that only a Sith possessed one of these objects as a means of navigating to the Sith home world, but it still felt like a stretch. An acceptable one though. The part that I didn't like though and am openly opposed to was the Sith dagger. Engraving directions on a dagger of how to find a Sith artifact kept in the emperor's vault on the wreckage of the Death Star was a pretty hard pill to swallow, but I could swallow it. What I couldn't stomach though was the part where the dagger opened up to line up with the Death Star's remains if you stood in this one specific spot. That was not only incredibly stupid, but also completely unnecessary, especially since they could have just had Rey sense the Dark Side of the Force emitting from the wayfinder in the emperor's vault when standing in that spot instead, and then simply figuring out that that's where she needed to go. But still, one real bad moment against an otherwise enjoyable movie didn't affect it as a whole.
I still enjoyed it overall, despite its flaws.
Having Rey be Palpatine's granddaughter though was a little, eh, for me. Not because it ret-conned her parents being nobodies by saying that they chose to be nobodies in order to hide her, it just seemed kind of strange. And yeah, I guess being the emperor of the galaxy, despite looking like a raisin, Palpatine would still be able to get laid, even if it were just from a concubine or something, but maybe having her be his great granddaughter would have made more sense time-wise, as Palpatine was already twice Anakin's age, but then I guess if that were the case then her and Kylo matching up as a Force dyad wouldn't have happened, and it did allow the plot line of Palpatine wanting to possess her to happen, unless that's just something that all Master Sith and their apprentices do. But then why tell Kylo to kill her at the beginning of the movie? Maybe he said that to manipulate him in some way? I don't know. I guess I just prefer the idea that she came from nothing special and could still rise to greatness to be better than the overused trope of her parents did it all to protect her, which wasn't as interesting. But it did give us a bit of an explanation as to how things came so easily with the for to Rey, making her less of a Mary Sue than she originally seemed, so that was good. And I like how she channeled all the past Jedi in order to destroy Palpatine once and for all.
And then there was Kylo sacrificing himself for her. I kind of saw that coming, and that it would lead to his death ever since they first used Force healing. Speaking of which, I, unlike many, didn't have a problem with Force healing, since that's been part of Star Wars canon for years. But back to Rey and Kylo, I enjoyed their interactions with each other, and seeing how their Force bond grew over time. And the movie also confirmed Reylo to be canon, no matter what kind of BS back-pedaling Disney tries to do to claim that a clearly romantic kiss was just kiss of gratitude because some people kept claiming that the relationship was abusive. Pfft, right, like that's a thing. I was even content with Kylo dying soon afterward, although a part of me was hoping that he wouldn't be redeemed since we already saw that with Anakin.
The movie also had other nice surprises. It was cool to see Lando again, and I'm surprised how much of Leia we got. And the big space battle at the end was pretty cool, especially with the whole galaxy united against the First Order, truly putting an end to it by showing that they wouldn't tolerate their tyranny. I totally called the Hux being the spy in order to get rid of Kylo though, and I did expect more from the Knights of Ren than what we got. So while the movie had plenty of flaws, I was still able to thoroughly enjoy it, and consider it a good conclusion to the Skywalker legacy and the episode series as a whole.