It's more than a film

Rating: 2/10 (1 March 2018)

Why is this film so many negative reviews. Why care about a film so much?
Why do so many people feel so angry, what has generated scores of vitriolic YouTube rants. And why do I feel the need to watch and read so many of them, every day checking for new ones?
I think I want to be in the company of true Star Wars fans. The people that used to come together to feel warmly about a story that meant something for them as they grew up. It is more than just a franchise, they truly were special, or at least they used to be. The Last Jedi has forever taken away that status for many fans we know come together vent our spleens. This isn't Marvel, you can't reboot this with new actors, they had one chance to complete the saga with the original actors and they blew it.
And I am not some Alt Right Fanboy, I do not collect toys, play Battlefront or know the whole extended Universe (not that there is anything wrong with doing that). I just love the films. Also, I am just the sort of left-leaning Snowflake that SJW content should appeal to. But something comes before that in filmmaking- TAKING THE AUDIENCE WITH YOU. I could have bought Luke's conversion to grump IF they had sold it to me properly and earned it.
So what is wrong? You probably know all about the plot holes and the treatment of Luke. The contradictory "what is heroic sacrifice for" message, the "on the nose" political lessons, so I won't labour them again. For me the greatest crime is that it leaves you not caring what happens in Episode IX. Because Lucasfilm have already decreed that there will be no CGI Carrie Fisher, we know that Leia has to die off screen, so presumably (unlike Han) there will be some kind of funeral or memorial service to mark this. Who will be in this scene? Characters that have little or no screen history with her? I guess they will have Chewbacca make a noise, and Luke appear as a Force Ghost. But now we know that Leia Poppins has tremendous Force powers, where will her Force Ghost be?
And what about Rey? She is the hero of this trilogy despite having very little character development. She now has no history to discover and no powers to train or perfect, she already is complete. So where do you take her? The only thing that keeps springing to my mind is that as Kylo told her that her parents were "nobodies", maybe they were literally "no-one". Going one step further than Anakin, she has no mother either, and the people that sold her for "drinking money" found her under a bush or something. At least that would explain her complete mastery the Force without training.
Alas the feeling seems to be that "creators" seemed determined to turn this saga into some kind of "Twilight" in space, forcing a love story between our "Hero" and someone we know to be a Homicidal maniac (patricide, village of women and children). But I guess that is a subversive idea for a family film so it'll happen.
I leave you with an analogy. It's like when someone buys football team. The "team" only really exists as an idea in the minds of the supporters (players, management and even stadiums change). It is up to the new owners to take care of the idea, look after it and ensure that the supporters continue to believe in it. Disney and Lucasfilm just did an MK Dons. We just have to dream that Episode IX is AFC Wimbledon. Maybe we'll be surprised, I live in hope.
(Sorry I don't know an American equivalent, but if you don't know- a football team was bought, owners moved it to another city, supporters felt completely shafted so stopped supporting it, eventually setting up a replacement team in the original location)
Oh 2 stars because. 1 It looks great. 2 John Williams.