Great parts outweigh the bad parts.

Rating: 8/10 (28 December 2017)

There were glaring problems with this movie, but I didn't mind so much because it was so dramatically satisfying. I tried to not find out too much about it prior to seeing it because I wanted to finally watch a Star Wars movie without knowing how it ended. Thankfully the movie followed through on the most interesting things from episode seven and the trailer.
The whole plot line with Rose, Finn, Poe, and the resistance was pretty annoying to watch. Finn and Poe both have potential to be much better characters than they are, but instead they are stuck in a section of the story that basically just sets up a bunch of lame action sequences and extra levels for the Lego video games that will come out eventually. The writers tried to buff it up with bad jokes, cute animals, a bad attempt at commenting on class oppression, and an even worse attempt at romance between Rose and Finn. All the false duplicity within the remaining resistance people was centered around a good concept, trying to feel heroic as opposed to actually being heroic. But I found all of these scenes very tedious to watch and was so glad when Vice Admiral Holdo (Laura Dern) finally died. The worst part of it was the Benici del Toro character. However, there were two good payoffs that came from this line: first was Finn's defeat of Captain Phasma and the first ever good usage of the term "rebel scum". Second, the final moment with the kid and the broom staring out at the night sky was a nice tribute to the way that so many young Star Wars fans play at being Jedi.
While I may have hated the aforementioned scenes, I didn't mind that they were there as much because the plot concerning the Force was as good as I'd hoped it would be. I was surprised when Snoke was killed after getting very little development. I'd expected him to become the Palpatine of this trilogy that would die at the end of episode nine, but I was glad that he died because it gave more focus to Kylo Ren. I love the way he is sometimes reserved but also unleashes his anger in perfect Sith fashion. On that subject, I also found it interesting how this episode emphasized that the Force is a balance and should not revolve around the black and white concept of Jedi versus Sith. The scenes between Rey and Kylo Ren were really interesting to watch and their relationship still has a lot of unresolved tension that I want to see more of. Luke Skywalker got better treatment in this movie than the original three IMO, and the final fight between him and Kylo Ren at the end was awesome. The only thing involving the Force that I didn't like was the moment when Leia could all of a sudden just fly back into the ship while unconscious, with no explanation whatsoever.
If you haven't seen this yet and are considering, definitely go see it. It may not be your favorite Star Wars movie, but it could be. Yes, there are a couple plot holes and some annoying things about it, but there's a lot of good stuff to make up for it. The action scenes are both cool and, in most cases, important to the rest of the story. No idea how they're going to successfully kill off Leia for episode nine, but that is certainly not the only thing I am anticipating. Overall Rating: 7.8/10.