Review of Star Wars: The Last Jedi (2017) by Ixnatifual — 25 Dec 2017

The Last Jedi is a film with lots of window dressing but little in the way of substance or originality. Saying it is poorly written is somewhat of an understatement. Little in the story makes sense, and the sequel to The Force Awakens fails to pick up on many of the unanswered questions left open in the previous film. Events are clumsily forced, resorting to hand-waving at best and having competent characters acting jarringly stupid and out of character at worst.

Many of the scenes in the movie are rehashed versions of scenes from The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi, with the original participants in the scene substituted by the new cast. Usually there is a little twist making the scene slightly different than the original, but the movie becomes frustrating to watch as it rehashes scenes we’ve seen done better in previous films.

Not only that, but there are major things in both this and The Force Awakens that invalidate previous films and characters and makes you question what was the point of it all? Luke’s efforts to become a Jedi across three films seem wasted when Rey can exceed the power of one of the most powerful Force users in existence in about 20 minutes without having any training. The victory over the Empire means nothing when The First Order simply replaces them with their own playboy-dressing Emperor copy. Clones are no longer needed to have an infinite supply of Stormtroopers for yet again unexplained reasons. Even the victory over Starkiller base in The Force Awakens is disregarded as The First Order now apparently have conquered the entire galaxy, despite them being left vulnerable to retaliation for the atrocities committed in TFA.

While some parts feel a little too much like a video game, the movie’s special effects team and designers have generally done an outstanding job. And it would be unfair to not mention that there are a few very interesting and intense scenes that are not only epic, but also manage to capture the personality and relationship between key characters in the universe. In these moments it’s nice to see what is actually a great cast given an opportunity to show what they can do.

Unfortunately, these moments are rare in a lazily copy-pasted minimum effort story that leaves you wondering why Disney couldn’t be bothered to get a decent writer or writing team on board for such a prestigious project, instead of simply assuming the masses aren’t intellectually capable of looking past the flash, and that the usual review outlets lack the courage or integrity to call a spade a spade.

But maybe the joke’s on us, because ticket sales are sky high and the critic scores are just about doubling the user scores across the web. For me personally, I have lost the appetite for watching the final chapter. But will people forgive the transgression or mindlessly shamble into the dark theater again next year? I fear they might.