Hollywood mediocrity strikes back...

Rating: 6/10 (24 December 2017)

...and crushes the new hope that J.J. Abrams gave us with his fresh yet nostalgic take on the franchise. I liked virtually everything about The Force Awakens, as well as everything else that Disney has done with Star Wars up to this point (SW Rebels, Rogue One). But The Last Jedi left me speechless for all the wrong reasons.
All the right ingredients are there: The new generation of Star Wars heroes that we've come to know and love in TFA, the old guard of beloved characters, the beautiful moments of nostalgia, the practical effects aided by sparingly used and excellent CGI, never-before-seen worlds, creatures and aliens... and yet, something crucial is missing.
One big culprit is the lackluster plot. It mostly comes down to a series of mildly entertaining, but ultimately pointless McGuffin chases. Only very few of the questions that were brought up by TFA receive rather disappointing and unspectacular answers. Two presumed-important characters die, but their deaths don't change anything of consequence. By the time the credits roll, we're essentially left with the same situation as by the end of episode 7.
It certainly doesn't help that too many plot points stretch the viewer's credulity to the breaking point and laugh in the face of the established internal logic of this fictional universe. Characters exhibit plot-convenient new force powers that no previous Jedi or Sith possessed, and the laws of physics are mere suggestions (more than ever before in this far-away galaxy). I'm no EU-versed hardcore fan, and I'm prepared to suspend a great amount of disbelief for a movie about telekinetic space knights with laser beam swords, but this was just too much. It's almost as if Rian Johnson said to George Lucas, "Loud explosions in space? That's nothing! Hold my beer and watch this."
Worst of all though is how out of character the cast feels compared to TFA. I can write off Luke's uncharacteristic behavior as a result of old age and personal tragedy, but everyone felt strangely off-kilter and less alive in this movie. Rey isn't as level-headed as we know her, Kylo is nowhere near as menacing and driven, and the few attempts to rekindle the light-hearted buddy cop dynamic between Finn and Poe fall flat.
Bottom line: While I understand why many moviegoers found TLJ entertaining enough or even refreshingly different, only few things about this middling effort felt truly like Star Wars to me. Unlike TFA and Rogue One, which successfully rekindled the magic of the original trilogy within a meaningful plot, TLJ is just another formulaic Hollywood movie.