If there is such a thing as Star Wars-by-numbers; this is it.

Rating: 4/10 (5 May 2020)

Okay, grab your checklist...

Opening crawl... iconic Star Wars theme blasting out over the top
incompetent Empire/First Order employee gets assaulted by the main antagonist to show us he means business and even the prospect of a HR lawsuit won't deter them against issuing brutal retribution
Lightsabre fight with swirling overhead camera
Millennium Falcon chase through debris/obstacles that wipes out a dozen smaller, nimbler craft
ESCAPE ... ah but someone is following them
Another lightsabre fight, even less inspiring this time than the last - (note to actors/choreographers: at least look like you are trying to HIT your adversary)
Another planet-destroying weapon... I mean, does an Empire just want to blow the s*** out of everything?
Big, climatic dogfight and explosions
What was an impenetrable fortress 30 seconds ago can now be destroyed by relatively modest ordnance
Climatic duel where both parties try to talk each other to death - Achilles heel of the antagonist revealed when our hero has been floored for seemingly the final time
Celebrate! Lots of hugging, dancing and awkward kiss, little realising they'll be doing the same thing all over again in a years' time...

Not an original idea in two hours of film. Just rehash after rehash, with a few cameos thrown in for a cheap crowd-pleasing moment.
Ignoring the impressive special effects and score, this most recent trilogy felt little more than fan fiction. No cohesive story arc through the 3 films, little in the way of development, characters / creatures / locations lobbed in and then discarded almost on a whim. Not one mention in the 8 previous films of the place the saga eventually ends... a sure sign that Abrams and Johnson were incapable of weaving their take into the already rich fabric of the story so just made up some entirely new, unreferenced setting.
And then don't explain:

How or why Palpatine 'mysteriously' came back from the dead?
What was Finn going to say to Rey?
What did Lando's (odd) remark at the end mean?

And what was the point of the 'spy'? Who managed to remain undetected for 2 and a half movies without so much as an inkling from either side before revealing himself and being killed all in the space of 3 minutes.
PS oh and I'm still waiting for any explanation as to why the First Order is this all-powerful entity and the Jedi / Rebels / Resistance are again scrabbling around for survival, despite the decisive victory at the end of Episode VI.