Review: The Rise of Skywalker Doesn't Really Mean Anything

My last blog entry made it pretty clear that I enjoyed The Last Jedi (2017), and it's been 2 years. I'm not arguing the merits of the movie anymore, and every complaint against it I've heard has been under-cooked and mis-interpretive garbage anyway. No, really. Just a fuck-ton of uncharitable takes on the people who made the film, the themes of the film, or nitpicks that amount to poorly-disguised vitriol.* And that's ignoring the blatant racist and sexist takes! So, we don't have time to address those again. Besides, there's an actual elephant in the room now...

Alright...let's address the one thing that shouldn't be a spoiler to everyone who's seen the trailer(s): Emperor Palpatine, the shadowy principle antagonist of the last 2 trilogies, is back. And that sucks.

When Return of the Jedi (1983) ends, we're to believe that good guys win, bad guys lose, and the big bad Darth Vader has redeemed himself by turning on the evil mastermind behind it all to save his son. With Palpatine alive and well, that act is kinda meaningless now. He didn't kill the man who corrupted him, but a stand-in for that man. And the heroic Rebellion didn't really accomplish anything but blowing up a couple of bases. Not exactly something that deserves a universal-wide celebration of victory, is it?

What the f** are you idiots smiling about!?

STOP DANCING, GODDAMNIT!!

In short, Palpatine's very inclusion sets the entire story back to the stage set in 1983. And by that, I mean the beginning of Jedi not its conclusion.

Many Bothans died for absolutely *nothing*

That is a problem, but on the grander scale. And to get into the other grand scale issues will dip into spoiler territory, so let's just talk about the film itself for now. The Rise of Skywalker on its own is a...well...

There's a LOT to sink your teeth into in this movie. The only problem is it's like being served a thawed-out, unseasoned chicken dinner. Not only is it disgusting, but guaranteed to make you sick in due time. The ideas are plentiful, but not a single one of them is new or even gets a chance to develop. Instead, they're wedged in between plot point markers as the characters rush from fetch quest to fetch quest like the cast of a half-written RPG. In fact, The Rise of Skywalker follows the exact same narrative structure and basic premise as The Force Awakens (2015) to such an extent that it feels like J.J. Abrams was locked in autopilot. Young heroes search for a map to the secret location of an ultra powerful old man. Only difference in this regard is this time is the old guy is evil AND thought to have been dead for at least 20 years. That's exactly where he and his name should've stayed, actually: In the distant rear-view of this story.

Alright, if you made it this far then it's time to get into the details. So...

**SPOILERS INCOMING**

There's a LOT about The Last Jedi that thematically benefits the entire franchise, but one thing most of all. The idea that Rey, the new trilogy's protagonist, is the offspring of a couple of nobodies. This broke away from the pattern of Star Wars where the previous trilogies centered on a member of the Skywalker family. But in doing so stressed the larger point that The Force is much bigger than just the Jedi or the Sith (which reduces the concept to a childish binary conflict). It belongs to everyone because anyone can achieve greatness.

This is YOU and every kid who ever waved a stick around while making a humming noise. Toy or not. That's the whole point, guys...

Luke even spells out this message when giving Rey her first lesson. And before him, Yoda expressed this in Empire when explaining what The Force is to Luke. So, making Rey the granddaughter of Emperor Palpatine is crippling to the movie and the franchise as a whole.

Even more than the implication that this guy fucks

On one hand, it feeds into the misguided thought that Rey's crisis is one of identity. That was a part of Luke's journey, not her's. Rey's path was defined by the need to abandon her dependency on the past from the very start. The Force Awakens is literally all about this for Rey. She'd have no story at all if she stayed fixated on her parents, and the amount of time she wasted on Jakku is directly linked to that fixation. Her story was all about freeing herself of that burden, then this movie re-burdens her with connections to the past that ultimately don't go anywhere. In fact, not going anywhere is a running theme of The Rise of Skywalker.

So much of what takes place over the course of The Rise of Skywalker is a cowardly walkback from anything resembling consequences. Chewbacca gets captured and carted away by The First Order, and oh no! The transport ship carrying him exploded! Chewie is DEA--oh. It was a different ship. He's fine. C-3PO can give our heroes the info they need, but only if his memory is erased foreve--oh. R2-D2 has a backup file that conveniently brings him back from being the butt of a few amnesia jokes...but he still can't recall any memory of Anakin Skywalker which WOULD'VE BEEN A RELEVANT DEVELOPMENT TO USE TO TIE THE 3 TRILOGIES TOGETHER!!

The only reason I can think of for not thinking of that possibility is that no one involved ever valued Threepio as a character.** Then again, there's hardly any time to value any characters when so much of it is devoted to destroying the stage set for an interesting movie.

Think about it: How much run-time could've been saved if ONLY the ending of The Last Jedi was embraced? Just the death of Luke Skywalker and the subsequent inspiration that is supposed to have spread throughout the universe as a result. Would we need a plot point about the rebels needing to find reinforcements? If Kylo Ren remained the principle threat instead of LITERALLY propping up a corpse, wouldn't Hux turning against him have held more weight and built both characters towards a fitting end? I mean, instead of revealing Hux as the mole in The First Order only one scene before killing him and making the reveal pointless. But this is getting into the territory of disparaging a movie for what it isn't...and that's bad criticism. Especially when what the movie is sucks enough on its own. And I need not point to any other person to make my point but Kelly Marie Tran.

The world mostly knows her as "Rose Tico," the Resistance engineer turned reluctant adventurer who helped Finn see what it means to be a rebel while discovering that she has the courage and skill to be a hero herself.*** That's if you viewed the film and the role she played in it charitably...or honestly. Let's be real. To a far too vocal contingent, Rose was a nuisance who "ruined the movie" or some other bullshit claim made to mask their issues with women.

...or deny it. It's not like we all can't tell.

In the real world, this had to be a dream come true quickly turning into a nightmare. Any actor is hoping for a real opportunity that will be an avenue to more work and the kind of work that they wanna do. A Star Wars movie should tick all of those boxes and then some. What did she get? Death threats, rape threats, and racist and misogynist criticisms so overwhelming in its volume that she left social media entirely. That's tantamount to being chased out of public life, and "fans" did that to her. So, surely the movie wouldn't share their sentiment, right? Then it happened...

"Rose, you coming on this adventure?"
"No, gotta clean these speeders. General's orders."

After being a major supporting role in the film just prior to this, Rose Tico gets noticeably sidelined for the bulk of the movie. Why? I don't really know for sure. Maybe it was by the actor's request, but I'm skeptical af. Especially in a movie that reveals its main protagonist is a blood relative to one of the most powerful men in the known universe. A reveal that misses the point of her arc on one hand, and provides an explanation for her skill and ability to the worst of pedantic fanboys on the other. The same kind of fan who would think Chewbacca would even give a shit about a medal for a task from 40 fucking years ago.**** These are decisions that weren't made to advance the narrative or build the characters.. They were made to placate fans of the most shallow level, and that includes shoving Rose to the side because some "fans" decided that they hate her and the movie that featured her. I can forgive a lot of things, but this will never get a pass from me. She deserved better than this.

I'm sure the usual "turn your brain off" defense was already in the pipeline 4 paragraphs ago, but spare me. I never turned my brain off for a Star Wars movie before, and I'm not about to start now. Especially not for the only one that couldn't even make its title make sense...

As I said before, there's a LOT to cover in this movie. So much of it ranging from embarrassing...

The Knights of Ren

...to disappointing...

The Knights of Ren

...to downright groan-inducing, and that's where the ending comes in. After the movie resurrects Emperor Sheev Palpatine one more time to fail yet again, Rey goes to the Lars home on Tattooine for no other reason than because WE would recognize it. Remember, the only Skywalkers that grew up on this planet FUCKING HATED IT. And Leia has no attachment to this place at all outside of that time they came to get Han Solo and immediately leave. So, the idea of Rey burying Luke/Anakin and Leia's lightsabers at Uncle Owen and Aunt Beru's old place makes no sense. But then an old woman asks Rey for her name to which she dramatically responds "Rey Skywalker."

See, this would carry a lot more meaning if Rey was still unconnected to any other preexisting character. Then it would be her solely making the choice to carry on the legacy of that name while making a place for herself in the story...but she's a Palpatine. Her parents "sold her to protect her" (something so stupid only the guy that thought the "Martha" reveal in Batman v. Superman (2016) was a good idea could write it), but never did anything to her out of malice. Abandoning the Palpatine name in favor of being a Skywalker is just to spite her grandfather, but it also reduces Rey's arc one last time by making her dependent on the past to define her future. Her journey to self-realization is lessened when all she's done is switch from the name of one famous and powerful family to another. If Rey absolutely had to be a Palpatine...

She didn't.

...then she would've completed her arc by answering the woman with "just Rey." But then you'd have to think of a title that's actually poignant...which you needed regardless.

The truth is no movie is perfect, least of all Star Wars movies. So, it all comes down to whether the good can outweigh the bad in any case. And as I sit here thinking about the myriad of stupid things that this movie presented without care or thought that I don't even have the energy to get into ("The ridges on that knife were designed ONLY to line up with the design of the Death Star!? How the fuck does that have any practical use OR make sense?"), it's impossible for me to think of Star Wars Episode IX: The Rise of Skywalker as anything approaching good.

Oh, and the 2-second shot of nameless women kissing is NOT cut out of the Chinese release of this movie. Stop trying to blame the cowardice of this film on China!! China doesn't even give a shit about Star Wars!!! Why would they give a damn about a franchise that already underutilized Donnie Yen!?

I can't anymore. Jesus take the wheel...

*--Seriously, if this sounds AT ALL like your issues with the movie...just consider re-examining things.

**--That, and/or not having seen the prequel trilogy at all. Not that I'd blame anyone for that...

***--I told you!! The Last Jedi keeps hammering this point home!!!!
****--Which also implies that they could've given him the thing anytime between then and now. The whole thing's not as heartwarming as it is stupid and myopic.