The force is NOT strong with this one

Rating: 4/10 (19 December 2017)

Like most crazy star wars fanboys I was really looking forward to this film - and the trailer looked like it might be a great follow up to the Force awakes, which despite the obvious parallels to A new hope, I really enjoyed. But unfortunately only 5 minutes in to the film I was already rolling my eyes and fearing the worst. The scene in question was when Poe (Evidently the greatest pilot ever known) drives out to the destroyer to speak to General Hux and, after his rousing response we get the old "Can you hear me?" joke - not funny the first time we hear it, and certainly not several minutes later when the joke is still going on. Unfortunately this misplaced humor is all too frequent in this episode (Reach out and feel the force - Oh, you don't mean with my hand? No Rey reach out like you did in the first film without any instruction!!!!)
Rian Johnson has to shoulder a lot, if not all of the blame for this. Why it seemed like a good idea to have someone else follow the story on astounds me as all the first film teased and built up is ruined in this one (EG: Snoke/Rey's parents) and leaves the trilogy in a worrying position for the last episode. This is the middle episode and should've left something for the final episode to deal with. I honestly have no idea what is going to happen in this film now. The end of the movie talks about how the story will inspire hope to the rest of the galaxy and feed the rebellion? How exactly? Being chased through space until you run out of fuel and then being picked off whilst you hide in a base whilst an old man distracts the bad guys whilst you escape isn't at all inspiring! if blowing up starkiller base didn't send people swarming to join the rebellion then how would this?
On to the cast.
By far the best scenes in the films are those involving the old characters, Carrie Fisher is fantastic in all of her scenes (Well, aside from the Mary Poppins scene - less said about that the better) and Mark Hamill is brilliant, despite how his character is written, And Chewie is excellent, if not criminally under used. I even enjoyed the Yoda cameo! However the young stars fail to grab my interest yet again. Poe constantly comes across as annoying and has no real depth to his character, and generally has no real impact on the story either. Finn at least has some sort of drive to him in this film by wanting to find Rey, yet his whole story arc is a pointless plot point which has no relevance to the overall story (I actually hoped he would sacrifice himself at the end of the film), what happened to him facing his demons from being a stormtrooper? This isn't even touched upon, except when he meets Captain Phasma, who again is a terrible character, why even bring her back? She is quite obviously this trilogy's Boba Fett - looks quite cool, but is actually pretty terrible! Even the scenes with Rey don't really endear me to her at all and she seems to go back and forth with her ability to use the force. Kylo Ren is explored a little more in this film and I would've liked to have seem more of his past with Luke as I thought this was the most interesting story in the film. But I'm not convinced of him as the big bad now, he seems constantly confused as to what to do and simply doesn't have that evil presence on screen. Darth Vader, whilst basically serving Grand Moff Tarkin still took no crap from folks, yet Kylo Ren and Hux constantly bicker with each other and neither convey any fear at all. It's like having the chuckle brothers being in charge of the first order.
Even though the film picks up a bit in the second half, overall as much as I hate to admit it, whilst not on prequel levels, this is one is one of worse Star wars films. Hopefully episode 9 restores some faith in the galaxy...!