Ranking the Skywalker Saga
By: Sheldon Norred
Tags: Film, Movie Review, Movies, Star Wars The Last Jedi, Star Wars

The Last Jedi was trending on Twitter this week, so I decided to make a list of the Skywalker Saga movies in order from best to worst. Stick around until the end for a surprise!

1. The Empire Strikes Back

The fifth installment of the epic sci-fi series is widely heralded as the best of its brethren. It and its predecessor are easily to most well-rounded of the nine films. The Empire Strikes Back stands above the rest because of its unique story, world-shattering twist, and commitment to end the movie with our heroes in major disarray.

2. A New Hope

Lightning in a bottle. Ever since Star Wars was released in 1977 everyone, George Lucas included, has been trying to recapture what made it so special. An ambitious adventure into a galaxy far far away, A New Hope is fun, charming, and daring. Sure, parts of it haven’t aged well but it should be revered for what it was and is.

3. The Last Jedi

I knew that I was going to get off easy for the first two. They are the obvious choice. This is the part where I always have to validate my Lifelong Star Wars Fan Membership card. Without question, The Last Jedi is the best episode of the Skywalker Saga since The Empire Strikes Back. I can go on for a while, but I’ll settle on just a few reasons why 58% of the Rotten Tomatoes audience rating is wrong.

1) The story is original. Yes, there are wide brushstrokes that echo the original trilogy, but the story beats are mostly new. I too could do without the casino hunt for the master codebreaker, but it wasn’t ultimately a major strike again the film. 2) The complexity of the characters coupled with the acting performances. Mostly, I’m talking about Kylo Ren. He is the most compelling villain that the Star Wars cinematic universe has ever seen. More than Darth Vader. More than Emperor Palpatine. Adam Driver is largely to thank for this. He shows perfectly the internal demise of Ren as he slowly drifts into the Dark Side. One of the more controversial decisions made by the writing team was the doubt and depression of Luke Skywalker. For some reason, fans were uncomfortable with beloved characters having a crisis of faith after a major failure. The decision was on par with Luke’s character to that point and it made him more compelling than some perfect hero who is completely unrelatable. Side note: Holdo is not being dumb or unreasonable for withholding information from Poe. He had just been demoted for his reckless behavior that led to many deaths. He does not deserve to know top secret information and Holdo would not know if he could be trusted. 3) It is beautiful. Easily the most striking of the nine movies, especially whenever you consider the use of red, black, and white throughout the third act.

Though The Last Jedi is certainly flawed, it is a creative breath of fresh air in an otherwise suffocatingly lackluster and vision-impaired sequel trilogy.

4. The Return of the Jedi

Okay, it gets weird from here on out. When I was a kid, I didn't give a thought to the Ewoks. Now, they're weird. Maybe not weird, but… stupid. Honestly, I really don’t mind them in the story but I do admit that they create so many continuity issues with the stormtroopers. The final chapter of the original trilogy is a fun and worthy conclusion to George Lucas’ original vision. Too bad half of the important stuff would be uprooted and spit on by JJ and Disney.

5. The Revenge of the Sith

The first sighting of the prequels on our list, The Revenge of the Sith may be the only one of the three worth showing to your grandkids one day. Many of the incredible moments in this movie fall short of their potential because of very weird decisions made while acting and directing. I understand that the prequels are supposed to be operatic in tone, but at this point, that just feels like an excuse for a bad script and flimsy execution. However, the turn of Anakin Skywalker into Darth Vader is worth every second. Also, the memes are great. Love the memes.

6. The Force Awakens

In 2015, this movie was the culmination of years of waiting and waiting for the series to be rebooted. It was a stunning return to form for the franchise… but maybe a little too much of return. It may not have been a shot for shot remake of A New Hope, but it definitely wasn’t trying not to be exactly that. The Force Awakens’ dependence on nostalgia decreases its rewatchability tremendously. Once I removed my rose-tinted glasses from this one, I saw some very interesting characters placed inside of a reboot ripoff of the 1977 classic.

7. The Phantom Menace

George Lucas really tried to start explaining his movies about space wizards with science. It was weird and I’m happy we’ve moved on. Pod racing, Jar Jar Binks, and a kid falling in love with someone who is obviously ten years older than them. Darth Maul and the Duel of the Fates is the only reason The Phantom Menace comes in above the next one.

8. Attack of the Clones

I hate sand. The only redeemable thing about this movie is Jango Fett and the maps that we ended up with for Battlefront II. I also had an action figure of Anakin whose arm could detach to imitate his dismemberment. In retrospect, very weird toy.

9. The Rise of Skywalker

I really was hoping that this movie would be so much more than it ended up as. The story was very campy, catering to the desires of Star Wars fans who wanted their lore-rich idealized script to finally come to light and “fix” the decisions made in The Last Jedi. We were perfectly set up for Kylo Ren to become the big bad, all leading up to a final battle between him and Rey where they would be torn between their destiny and their feelings for one another. Instead, Palpatine was resurrected. Or never died? The convoluted and jumpy plot was spoon-fed to the audience by constant explanations from supporting characters. That probably would not have been needed if they didn’t try to cram a five-hour movie into a three-hour time slot. Characters were wasted. Rey is wasted. Fin is wasted. Poe is wasted. The only character we get any kind of real, earned closure with is Kylo Ren. And it was almost pretty awesome. That aside, the rest of this movie was a dumpster fire. Some will blame Rian Johnson for the demise of the sequels, and that will be foolish and lazy. This final installment in the Skywalker Saga had the opportunity to tie our story up into a nice, rebooted bow. Instead, we were left with more questions than answers.

The Mandalorian rules though. Go watch the Mandalorian.