90% safe and marketable mediocrity, 10% interesting ideas

Rating: 7/10 (14 December 2017)

I'm not going to tell you whether it was good or bad, this is for you to decide. I will just try to share my experience. Spoiler-free, of course, yet there is not that much to spoil in this episode. The movie was mostly predictable for a sane person.

Right of the bat, the first scene of the movie sets up the tone - this is a comedy. Nothing has to be taken seriously. Every strong or dramatic moment will most likely be ruined by a corky comedy scene to lighten up the tone. The studio does not want you to get upset, you know.

This also features a lot of improvisation. If you have seen Thor Ragnarok, this comes very close to that movie. I think the director believed that this will make the characters more grounded and real, yet it's just annoying most of the time. You're trying to get invested into a scene, and the movie takes you from your seat and shakes you up: "remember, no getting invested". Maybe it just doesn't work for me personally, IDK.

As the main plot developed I found myself mostly confused, lots of "what?" moments occur, things I could not explain to myself even though I'm not new to SW. It also features a couple of additional subplots only one of which I found interesting, not going to spoil it though. New characters were introduced, mostly to make the movie more marketable and to bring more "diversity". You can see corporate decisions behind this - no chances at sexism, racial discrimination or anything trending right now, maximum safety. This is a second installment with the new characters and yet I still can find myself rooting only for the classic ones, and there are not that much of those left. Due to some unfortunate real life events, I'm afraid the next episode will lose those as well, maybe I'm wrong though. It is also interesting how Chewie just doesn't work as a standalone character in the absence of Solo.

The acting made me question my understanding of the franchise. Hux, while being Hitler-like character in the 7th movie, now completely turned into a cartoon character or a parody by Charlie Chaplin. Rey's emotions and facial expressions are still indistinguishable, as well as Kylo's TBH. Poe and Finn come closest to having a real character arc and yet the movie still finds a way to throw that to the ground.

And this is where my main grudge with this movie lies. There were some really interesting and creative setups throughout the movie when the it baits you into thinking that the movie is going to get serious and do something unexpectedly good with the characters and the story. And then it just falls flat on its butt. Spoilers keep me from giving you examples of what I mean, but I'm sure you'll see those as well when you see the movie.

Overall, I wasn't too disappointed, I was mostly sad. If this is the Star Wars for the new generation, I'm happy to stay with the old one. Visuals were pleasing, space battles were well made, but this is not exactly what I'm looking for in SW.

P.S. Merch placement got really out of hand in this movie, I get it that these new creatures were made for the purpose of making money, but man they like to shove these into viewer's face.