Painful to watch

Rating: 2/10 (20 December 2017)

This is, by miles, the worst Star Wars movie ever.
I really loved all the other films. Even the prequels. The Force Awakens was brilliant and set up so much for the new triology. I was excited to see what Disney could do next!
Unfortunately, this movie is a total disappointment. Yes, they're taking the franchise in a new direction. It seems their new direction is facing away from everything we thought we knew about Star Wars and moving towards The Avengers. One of the older main characters has been completely misshandled by this film. The other characters, for the most part, have become boring and seem to have no motivations behind their actions. I don't see why Disney had to change the franchise this drastically. Why did they not just make a new original franchise?
The Last Jedi is a comedy/action film about a superhero. There aren't many important points in this film at all. The pacing is awful. The plot hardly moves forward at all after the first 20 minutes. Then everything is crammed in at the end. There are no classic Star Wars moments. That's what Star Wars is known for, great moments where the viewer can just sit back and take it all in. There's none of that. Giving John Williams no opportunity to hit us with any of his usual emotive soundtrack work. It's either action or comedy, or nothing.
Now the media are reporting that these poor viewer ratings are "fake news" left by bots. Honestly, I don't know a single person that enjoyed this film (though I'm from a cynical part of the world). I think it will eventually become clear after more people have seen this that it's just a bad film.
I hope this isn't a turning point for Star Wars as a whole, and somehow JJ Abrams saves this trilogy in film IX. I think that's unlikely.
If you're a fan of Star Wars and haven't seen this movie then I'd recommend avoiding it. Read the Legends books instead.