Masterpiece. I'm an original fan of 40 years.

Rating: 10/10 (9 April 2020)

This movie moved me to tears. I thought it was beautiful and a fitting end to the saga. The writing was actually quite brilliant and took its own form to tie together the inconsistencies of the two movies before it. I think it quite creatively succeeded. This movie now sits next to Empire as my favorite Star Wars story. Thank you to the many people who must have worked their entire beings to make this movie simply wonderful.
There was once a movie called Interstellar. I saw this movie twice in the theater (as I did with the Rise of Skywalker). And Interstellar in a different way, was an absolutely phenomenal film. However, the critics at the time did not approve of the sentimentality of the movie. I pleaded with many that it was easily the best movie of the last 5 years, I even got banned from r/movies for stating such a thing. Well now it's been many years since Intersteller's release and what do you know, it's considered one of the best movies of all time. What happened there?
Opinions on movies seem to be so easily influenced by a common concensus. The tribe says the movie's bad and so when you enter the theater, you get what you were expecting to see. I think this happened with The Rise of Skywalker. I know this happened. My viewing of the Rise of Skywalker had no preconceived notions of what or how the movie would play out. Immediately I realized that this movie was taking a new path. I sat in my seat filled with renewed awe at a brilliant style of storytelling blazing before my eyes. The pacing, acting, and connectivity in story telling left little pause to be discontent. I saw what made sense, and yes that was the Palpatine connection. I could write too many pages on this alone. But it truly makes sense if you follow the meaning behind the Jedi and time being but a mere inconvenience in the grander goals of complete domination. The Palpatine connection felt like it had been planned since A New Hope. It was right, it felt perfect.
The beauty and emotion captured in this movie, the friendships, and redemptions...very well done. When Rey looks past the streaking bolts of light to the universe and ever present force, I felt cinematic history being made. The pure beauty of such a moment- a rebirth. Again, accolades to the imaginations of the writers and visual designers! What a moment. And there are many such moments in this movie.
I could spend a year explaining why the scenes worked and why people are deciding they didn't, but I won't. Let me simply state this- the ring of Mordor could have been dropped into Mount Doom by Gandalf on an eagle, and it wasn't. It led to three wonderful movies. And so the knife that matched the remains of the Death Star- let's not forget that Palpatine had a plan of luring two powerful Jedis. And he could see well into the future. For this comes with the force. You don't even have to suspend disbelief, it makes sense. It all does, it's Star Wars!!!
I sat through the end titles of this movie in bliss. I thought "this is the end and they did it right." In a few years I think many people will start to have the Interstellar effect with this movie as they get past what others told them, and appreciate it for what it is- a beautiful friendship of good in the universe and a well made hope of the many uniting and working together in a galaxy far far away (and maybe closer than we think).