‘Your journey nears its end…’
When The Force Awakens awoke back in 2015 it felt like a real cultural event. We hosted a Star Wars party at our house before hitting the midnight showing the day it came out. And it didn’t disappoint. I can admit now that a large part of what made that film so enjoyable was the sheer power of seeing some of the most beloved cinematic icons in action once again. The joy of encountering Han and Leia, Chewie and the Falcon… these things cannot be measured for someone who grew up loving Star Wars with a fierce intensity. In the years since, there has been four more Star Wars movies, various TV shows and animated series and a push on Star Wars toys and merchandise. This has led to a little Skywalker fatigue. The Rise of Skywalker sees JJ Abrams return to the franchise that he so reinvigorated with The Force Awakens, only this time he doesn’t have the nostalgia card of reuniting all of our old friends after a decades long absence. The Rise of Skywalker must stand on its own two feet…
Emperor Palpatine is back (despite the fact that he was very much dead at the conclusion of Return of the Jedi) and this is bad news for the galaxy. The resistance is weak but Rey, Poe and Finn still offer hope under the leadership of Princess Leia. Meanwhile, emo Kylo Ren looks to tighten his grip on the empire under the watchful eye of the evil Emperor.
First off, any flaws inherent within The Rise of Skywalker are not the fault of the cast. Oscar Isaac is a fantastic actor and we get more of Poe Dameron than ever before in this final film in the franchise. He shares a heartwarming chemistry with the similarly likeable John Boyega as Finn but it is Daisy Ridley as Rey who really steals the show. Ridley has taken a while to grow into her role but she carries this movie almost single handedly at times and her relationship with Princess Leia is a fitting and poignant end to Carrie Fisher’s final acting performance.
In terms of plot, there aren’t enough fresh ideas here to push Abrams’ final Star Wars film into the upper echelon of the franchise. Too much of this is stuff we have seen before and it also felt very indebted to video game plotting at certain points (we must find *object* to open *area*). The other issue, is that even after three movies, I’m not really emotionally connected to these characters in any meaningful way. The death of Han Solo really meant something because of how iconic that character is. The fate of Rey and Kylo Ren just doesn’t have the same impact, and the amount of deus ex machina involvement made the whole thing feel a little low stakes (something that has also plagued the MCU franchise and later series of Game of Thrones).
When leaving the theatre this time, my friend Phil commented ‘we’ve watched a Star Wars film, there was lots of Star Wars in it’ and I see his point. There was a lot of Star Wars. A little cameo here, some fan service there, clunky dialogue, family lineage, twist endings, cute droids. Everything is present and correct. What we don’t have is any kind of real emotional resonance. I was never bored. A couple of bits made me smile but a Star Wars movie should be so much more than that, particularly the last of the franchise.
So there we have it, an unfitting end to a series of movies that so often felt like a disappointment. We’ll always have the first three though. The force will always be strong with those movies.