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Spoilers Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker - Grading & Discussion

Grade the movie...


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This movie had three really great lightsaber battles, all of which involved one or both of this trilogy's co-protagonists*, which is both awesome and fitting.

* Rey Skywalker and Ben Solo, in case anybody is confused
 
I wouldn't say the entire series, but walking in, I really wanted a cool lightsabre battle and I got it with that scene. I really enjoyed that scene.

It had the spectacular moves of the prequels and the emotional punch of the original trilogy. Calling it the best in the entire series is a subjective judgement call that I certainly wouldn't expect everyone to agree with, but for me, it ticks all the boxes.

For what it's worth, I consider the throne room scene and Luke's confrontation in TLJ to be lightsaber duels. Just because the beams technically don't touch doesn't mean they don't count for me.

edit: also I should mention one of the things I really liked about The Last Jedi was the way it reconciled one of the big differences between the OT and PT and made it make sense.

In the OT, the Jedi are described as wise, ancient guardians of peace and justice, but when we see them in action in the PT, they're short-sighted, arrogant, and totally willing to put their principles aside in the name of political expediency. Luke's lessons to Rey explicitly called the Jedi out on this in a way I found really enjoyable.
 
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Likewise, discussing how the fact that the Sith Destroyers were based on the old ANH/R1 types, and not the newer ESB/ROTJ versions means the Death Stars make no sense; if Palpatine had already invented a ship-sized superlaser before the ISD-II was rolled out around the time the first Death Star was completed, why finish the battle station at all and not simply use his backup fleet to maintain control of the galaxy in the first place? Then I thought, it’s weird that the visual effects team could make a Cloud City model for one shot, but wouldn’t make a digital version of the ESB destroyers when they were far more prominent. And, while I’ll have to wait for the home release to be sure, those cannons looked like the ones from the FO dreadnaught in TLJ. And, oddly, the Art of TRoS book that was supposed to come out today has been delayed three months. Which makes me wonder if the closing battle had some major changes, or was added entirely, late in production, explaining why the making-of material would have to be revised, and why the Sith fleet was a kitbash of models they already had.

Not only that, but if the Emperor had a fleet of planet killer Star Destroyers, why did he even bother with Starkiller Base? Just the time and resources it would take to hollow out a planet and convert it into a Death Star, when he could send out one Star Destroyer, let it get blown up in an epic Rebel Alliance/Resistance battle, let said Resistance think they'd won, then send out another? This could cut down on all sorts of expenditures for the First Order.

All in all, I liked Rise of Skywalker. I absolutely LOVED the design of Exogol and thought the Emperor was creepy as fuck. He kinda reminded me of the Seer in Vikings. My only complaint in that area is I hate how crappy the Force lightning effects were. For some reason, the lightning effects in 1983 are LIGHT YEARS ahead of the crappy CGI Force lightning of present day.

I also kinda had a hard time believing that Kylo Ren, spending three movies blowing up planets and fucking up scores of people, would go back to the light after something so simple as being stabbed and healed.

We can also assume that Emperor Palpatine is one of those parents who encourages his kids to act like spoiled brats at Walmart. "GOOD! Let the anger flow though you!" :lol: Also, how do you think his wife took it when he returned home from the office one day after Mace Windu melted his face with his own Force lightning? :lol:

If I had to rank the movies right now:

RotS
RotJ
ESB
ANH
Rogue One
TPM
AotC
TRoS
TFA
TLJ
Solo
 
Alright I'm going to just come right out and say it.

Rey and Kylo Ren's duel on the Death Star wreckage was the best lightsaber duel in the entire series.
I don't know, the Snoke throne room was amazing and Maul/Kenobi/Ginn is hard to beat. It WAS good......just not the BEST for me.
 
Liked: seeing Force Ghost Luke, Han/Ben moment, return of Palpatine, Rey destroying Palpatine, return of Lando.

Disliked: the movie felt clunky, too much was happening. The original trio all dying, it would’ve been so nice to see Leia survive considering Han and Luke are dead.

I would’ve liked to have seen a hypothetical scenario (dream sequence maybe) of Rey becoming the Empress. It would have been cool.
 
Both the First Order and the fleet of Sith Destroyers were contingency plans for Palpatine in the event of his defeat/death, and the latter was most likely put in place before the former.
 
There was a bunch of times I felt like I was watching a parody of Star Wars on SNL or something (especially in the first hour).

I'm going to go with a C.
 
Because of the decisions that were made in both TLJ and TRoS, I think rewatching the Sequel Trilogy is going to be a really fun experience when you know going into The Force Awakens that Ben Solo/Kylo Ren might be the bad guy of the story, but he's actually one of the trilogy's overall protagonists along with his opposite and equal, Rey.
 
So I gave a block of criticism earlier, now I want to talk about one of the things in the movie I did rather like. The running subplot with Finn and his "confession" to Rey. Watching the film it struck me as really odd, and I was expecting some stupid love triangle plot to develop. Especially as it kept coming up throughout the film.

So imagine my delight when I realized what Finn was actually trying to say! Our former stormtrooper is Force sensitive after all. Rey won't be the last Jedi for long. I really liked the relatively subtle way that they introduced it, first hinting at it with Finn's conversation with Janna about just feeling it and then finally confirming it after Rey's battle with Palpatine. I thought that was really well done, and nicely rounded back to TFA and Finn's use of the lightsaber before Rey took it up.
 
The Ones, those three who embodied the Force on Mortis.

Kor

Is that from The Clone Wars? My only familiarity with this franchise really is the movies (And Mandalorian) but I would like to get into Clone Wars and Rebels.
 
I don't care if it was an energy bow, it still (as far as the audience is concerned) a bow and arrow.. dumb scene.

The movie was a huge mess. We gotta get this thing to tell us where this thing is, so that can tell us where this thing is. That's not good writing when there are as many MacGuffins as there are main characters, or when it really doesn't matter that these things are in space, journeys are instantaneous. but it seems disingenuous since the last film had a long boring 18 hour chase that felt like it was 18 hours of screentime.

At least the sense of adventure that served as the undercurrent of this film was far better than falling asleep during the utter boring last movie

I think SW is served much better by a cleaner, straightforward narrative
 
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Still no Coruscant though. How do you do a montage a forget THE planet?

Still no bloody Coruscant though. I would like to know the status of that planet.

I’d have liked to see it too, and when they mentioned Lando going to the core systems that’s what I thought they were going to do.

Thought I saw a destroyer crashing behind the senate tower; Around when one does on Ewokia.

I'm 99 percent sure that we see the towers and skyscrapers of Corruscant at the very beginning of the film, when Finn and Poe do micro-jumps.
 
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