Star Chores

Rating: 5/10 (28 December 2019)

First, the good things about this film. Visually it really is very impressive. It looks like a Star Wars film.
So that's the good stuff out of the way. The biggest problem with this film is that it treats its audience like idiots. Implausible scene follows implausible scene in ways that even 'the force' can't explain away. Admittedly this isn't a new issue. A New Hope has plenty of 'convenient' events. Even if you ignore all of the additional problems introduced by the prequels, ANH still has the droids happen to be bought and taken to Luke, who happens to know Old Ben Kenobi, who happens to live nearby. But this is palatable stuff in comparison to this film.
As a character I love Palpatine, so I will readily admit that I enjoyed seeing him again. However, there's no good reason for him being there that doesn't undermine the original and prequel trilogies in their entirety (unless Anakin's destiny was to have a daughter who gives birth to a dad-killing brat who shows up one day to lend Palpatine's inexplicably existing granddaughter some moral support and an extra lightsaber).
It's never clearly explained what he is. A clone? A corpse from RotJ? The original Sith Lord that just happens to look like Palpatine? When did he have a kid? Who was the mother? Did he raise his son? The most powerful man in the universe just happens to raise a nice guy who has the freedom to meet a nice girl, have their own daughter, and hide her away? When did that happen? Was this the first time any Sith Lord had offspring?
Why do Wayfinders even exist? Who made them and when? Why would Palpatine have one on the 2nd Death Star? Why would an ancient knife exist that highlights its location on said Death Star's crashed remains?
The logic of this film collapses like a house of cards in the slightest breeze. There's no story being told; it's just a series of random fetch quests and repeated beats of RotJ. Visually it's great, and an entertaining rollercoaster, but the story is held together with safety pins. Ren slaughters a load of people (including his dad), but has a change of heart when his mum dies. Rey says 'sure, why not' when given the choice to be possessed by her evil grandfather. Other people do other things that make no difference. Lando laughs a bit.
Even from a cynical cash grab perspective it doesn't make sense. Palpatine would have been desperate to find his granddaughter; seems like a good setup for a bunch of new and marketable bounty hunters to me. Instead just send Ren on a series of unsuccessful missions to kill her for no reason.