CAUTION! This blog contains spoilers for The Rise Of Skywalker. You have been warned.
Star Wars - The Rise Of Skywalker is out in cinemas. Even though I enjoyed the movie itself, it wasn't a satisfying end to the trilogy or the entire Skywalker Saga to me. In this blog I will discuss the reasons for that, as well as 5 small changes, that would have made The Rise Of Skywalker a better movie.
The Weaknesses of The Rise Of Skywalker
For me The Rise Of Skywalker turned around the weaknesses of The Last Jedi. While Last Jedi was a good movie by itself, it didn't work inside Star Wars for many fans (I have certain issues with it, but there are parts like Luke's story that I love about it). The Rise Of Skywalker on the other hand is undeniably a terrible movie - yet it works inside the Star Wars saga for many people, including me. But, and this is a point where I disagree with a lot of people, for me it was not a satisfying conclusion - neither for the Sequel Trilogy nor for the Skywalker Saga. I did not like the movies first half, which felt like a mixture of "how do we explain everything and set up the finale we have in mind" with "how can we introduce cool new characters, insert a pseudo-death of C-3PO into the trailer and make the movie long enough". The film really started to work for me with Rey and Kylo's duel on the deathstar, Rey almost killing Kylo, just to realize she tapped into the dark side and give her a great moment with Luke's force ghost, and on the other side give Kylo a reason to turn good again, and the well deserved goodbye to his parents. The final battle both in space and in the Sith temple were awesome, leading to a good finale of the Saga - but, as I said, storywise not a satisfying finale.
What would have made it a better movie?
Lightsabers
Every trilogy's hero had his own lightsaber by the third movie. Anakin even had a lightsaber in Episode II, which he lost and had to use someone else's lightsaber, but by the third film of his arc, he had his iconic lightsaber, which we already knew from the original trilogy.
Luke lost his father's lightsaber (thanks to his father) on Bespin, so he had to build his own weapon for his third film, his iconic green lightsaber.
For the sequel trilogy, LucasFilm brought back Luke's old saber a.k.a. Anakin's, so they could ride the nostalgia of that blue blade. But with it beeing destroyed in The Last Jedi, they had the perfect opportunity to introduce a new, unique saber for Rey. I wished, Rey would have used her new yellow saber throughout the film, instead of just introducing it in the final scene. It would have given her character and fighting a lot more personality.
But there are two more minor problems I have with lightsabers in this film: First, why doesn't Kylo get his mother's lightsaber instead of Luke's? This would have made it an emotionally even more powerful scene, and also the lightsaber might have been broken/cut/whatever in half, so that Rey could have buried four half lightsabers in the end. How much more power would that have had?
Adding to this, I don't understand why Luke had his blue lightsaber in the training flashback with Leia. In this period of time, he should have wielded his green lightsaber from Return Of The Jedi.
Palpatine's backstory
"The dark side of the force is a pathway to many abilities some consider to be... unnatural."
Really? That's all the explanation you're gonna give me? How did he survive? Why did he only show himself now? To me this is the biggest plot hole of the movie. I don't think bringing Palps back was a good idea overall (just imagine: Kylo finds Palpatines holocron in the old Sith temple, he is the commander of the Sith fleet, and after the final battle he dies in Rey's arms, realizing his mistakes. But ok, they brought him back, so we'll go with that), but if you want to do it, you have to explain it. Palpatine doesn't just chill in the Unknown Regions for fun! You might argue he didn't just chill because Snoke was his work, but that brings us straight to the next point:
Snoke's backstory
So Snoke was a puppet all along? Seriously? That's a terrible joke. Snoke didn't act like a puppet, especially in The Last Jedi. There was no need to give him a full backstory, but if Palpatine actively used him, at least explain how he did it, so that it matches Snoke's behaviour from The Last Jedi. Or let Snoke just be an individuum standing for itself - you could have given him some backstory there, but there was actually no need to do so after his death in The Last Jedi. One way or another, his backstory was handled very very poorly in The Rise Of Skywalker.
The Rey Palpatine reveal
"Oh Rey, I just wanted to tell you I was wrong. You are descendant from (Grand-)Papa Palpatine, that's why you used force lightning. Have a nice day!"
This is how the reveal of Rey's true lineage felt to me. Again, I didn't need The Rise Of Skywalker to retcon The Last Jedi, but if you do it, do it right. Make it a real discovery instead of Kylo just saying it and that's it. Darth Vader's "I am your father" reveal had an emotional weight, because it made the seemingly trustable Obi-Wan a liar, because it made sense from how the scene an the whole movie went, without beeing predictable. The Rey Palpatine reveal on the other hand was both predictable (Rey's fighting style in The Force Awakens, her force lightning in The Rise Of Skywalker) and came out of nowhere. It didn't make Rey's character stronger, it made her weaker in a sense. I am glad it didn't really matter at the end (Palpatine could have wanted her as new emperor no matter who her parents were), and it didn't make her journey in the movie smaller because of that, but the reveal just didn't work for me at all.
Stop repeating The Last Jedi
This probably sounds like a weird thing to say about The Rise Of Skywalker, since it reverses so many things of The Last Jedi (Anakin's lightsaber, Rey's origin, Kylo's mask, etc.), but when you really think about it, many story elements are taken from The Last Jedi and wrapped into a nice fan-friendly story. Anakin's lightsaber is repared, just to be laid to rest at the end of the movie, pretty much like it was laid to rest in The Last Jedi. Rey and Kylo go back to flirting, just this time Kylo realizes his errors and turns (yes, I loved that kiss-die-scene, hate me for it if you want to). Rey is retconned to be a Palpatine, just to discover that - surprise - it doesn't matter who she is descendant from, because her choice to be a Jedi is what matters, not whether she is the granddaughter of Palpatine or just the daughter of alcoholic scrappers. And Kylo's mask is repaired, just so he could take it back off again, and show that he indeed still is Ben Solo deep inside. JJ Abrams doesn't hate The Last Jedi. He likes Rian Johnson's choices, but doesn't think he can tell that to the fans, which is why he repeats them, just nicely wrapped.
But what do you say about all of this? Do you disagree? Did something else not work for you at all? Leave a comment!
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