First draft level, diabolically poor storytelling and no substance

Rating: 1/10 (26 February 2019)

From the very outset of the movie the opening title crawl is loaded with poorly thought out sentences which contradict themselves and feels like a first draft rush-job. Perhaps the greatest let down is that the movie comes across as novice story telling from the initial title crawl and the lack of flow and development just doesn't engross the viewer (no suspense, no real threat, no reason to continue watching). Odd for a Star Wars movie, it features very unconvincing villains who are established as "merciless" and without-substance-heroes who aren't really threatened by a merciless enemy because the enemy is a comic failure . The old Star Wars characters are dealt with as though the writer isn't familiar with them and the "story" ends with no cliff hanger and the viewer is left with absolutely no reason to see the next episode.
It's the first Star Wars movie I've ever experienced the feeling that if I left my cinema seat to go for a coffee and take my time coming back that I would have missed nothing of worth. My wife and my children actually fell asleep at around the 20 minutes point and they were loaded with popcorn and slushies! I stayed awake but was fighting the urge to just get up and go because I thought I owed it to myself to see it to the bitter end in order to wait to see if it would improve. It didn't and it just became sillier. If I could describe the movie in one word then "missable" fits best.