Shot Through the Heart, and Disney's to Blame

Rating: 2/10 (16 December 2017)

With such a rich and deep canon, Star Wars fans have come to expect excellent writing and story telling within any production that takes place in a galaxy far, far away. Whether it's the movies, books, video games etc, Star Wars always comes with an engaging set of characters and plot that the consumer can totally immerse themselves in. For some reason (we all know it's the money), Disney decided to abandon this approach and instead shifted to cheap laughs and and attempt to use intense action sequences (I'll admit they were pretty cool at times) to disguise sub-par plot and character development. Star Wars fans deserve better...
I'll begin with the under-utilization of the classics. Chewbacca, R2-D2, and C-3PO were absolutely brushed aside in the Last Jedi. These already well-established favorites did not add anything to the story. Any attempt to give them a say was just a recycling and repackaging of memorable one-liners from the original trilogy in an attempt to gain cheap laughs. These characters should've played a much more integral role in the story and been provided an opportunity to expand on their individual stories. Additionally, the CGI recreation of Yoda looked extremely weird and turned me off of anything he had to say.
Moving to the new characters, I'll start with Rose. She is the one who comes up with the idea to turn off the tracking device that's allowing the First Order to pursue the Resistance fleet. This plan, however, never comes to fruition and turns out to be completely unnecessary. So that means we are stuck with this boring, regular human character (Episode VII was missing any attempt to bring in new alien characters) that provides nothing to the story. Even worse, she then goes on to prevent Finn from saving the day. I was getting goosebumps watching Finn make his Medal of Honor run to destroy the First Order's battering ram cannon. Rose decides, however, that Finn shouldn't give his life for the greater good and interdicts Finn's Resistance-saving moment of self-sacrifice. All so that we can get a cheesy line about fighting for what we love and a forgettable kiss between Finn and a character no one cares about.
Now, Vice Admiral Holdo. Apparently, she's a a great leader and a war hero but you'd never know it since she's wearing a designer dress with stylish purple hair while commanding a fleet. She also likes to lie to her subordinates about her true intentions and hold off on revealing her plans until the last second. Reminds me more of what you'd expect in a real housewives show, not Star Wars. I will admit, her act to destroy the dreadnought was legit but since I have no connection to the authenticity of the character, the value of the moment was greatly diminished. Why not just have Leia do it and go out with a bang since she's going to have to be CGI'd in the next movie anyway?
Snoke. Good ol' Snoke. He has decided to break with the Sith Lord tradition of wearing all black and instead chose to wear a shiny gold robe. So intimidating. Where is his story? Snoke has a huge role to play in supposedly being the one to turn Kylo Ren to the dark side but we have no idea who he is or where his power came from. So, similar to Holdo not representing a rebel hero, Snoke does not represent a Sith Lord, or even a credible villain. So once again the movie loses value. Despite his involvement in a pretty awesome execution, the gravity of the moment was lost due to there being no reason to care for Snoke's death.
A few other quick shoutouts: General Hux, completely lame and irrelevant. With no back story to explain why a 30 year old is leading the First Order and a lack of actual importance in the plot, he doesn't hold a candle compared to Grand Moff Tarkin and the likes. DJ (Benicio Del Toro's underwhelming character) and Captain Phasma...who, what, where, when and why is all I have to say.
Additional plot holes: How does Leia survive being blasted in space? How are Rose and Finn suddenly capable pilots when they attack the battering ram? Since when do ships in Star Wars rely on a depleting fuel source (not saying it's impossible, it's just weird that's it's never mentioned in any movie before but it becomes a key plot concept in the Last Jedi)? Why is their such importance placed on the skills of the "master hacker" when you can just find a bum in a prison cell who's capable of cracking the First Order's security system ? Why was DJ sulking in the cell to begin with when he could apparently escape at any moment? How is DJ aware of Holdo's scheme to abandon ship when he betrays the plan to Hux? Why does Hux decide to simply follow the fleeing Resistance ships and take pot-shots at it instead of sending the hundreds, if not thousands, of TIE Fighters within the dreadnought and supporting star destroyers to finish off the Resistance fleet? Or, why not send a few star destroyers ahead of the Resistance ships using hyperspeed and then turn around and come back at the Resistance head on? Courses of action that any competent commander would come up with but we are lead to believe that Hux just wants to slowly pursue and play hanky-panky. All of these moments discredited the plot and weakened the development of the story.
The Last Jedi was a tough pill to swallow. A few cool moments and crappy jokes do not come remotely close to making up for such a blatant lack of the quality characters and story-telling that have made Star Wars so enjoyable in the past. And this review did not even discuss the controversial handling of Luke's story (many feel his character was ruined by the cowardly way he was portrayed and his seemingly inexplicable death). Maybe in Episode IX we learn Snoke's story or they bring back DJ/Captain Phasma, but it's already too little too late. The movie should be able to stand on its own and it outright fails to do so making it not only a bad movie to watch but disheartening and disenfranchising to the lovers of the Star Wars universe.