Review of Star Wars: The Last Jedi (2017) by Scott E — 23 Dec 2017

Let me start by saying I don't have a problem with taking the Star Wars franchise in new directions. Nor do I feel that this story somehow betrayed the character of Luke Skywalker. I found it to be very problematic however for a host of reasons.

Tonally, it was multiple movies cobbled together. It was frequently trying hard to be funny. Humor in a Star Wars movie is great ('Who you calling scruffy looking?") but jokes are something different. While that movie was happening, we also had the buddy cop film with Finn and Rose, the Rey movie, the Kilo Ren movie... they all felt tonally different.

The movie was long - not always a problem - but it was unnecessarily long. An entire subplot was not only very poorly done, but was completely inconsequential.

Several terrific actors were wasted in this film. Benicio del Toro, Laura Dern and Oscar Isaac had almost nothing to do in this film. Dern and Del Toro played characters that were flat.

Literally from the first scene the movie is one head scratching moment after the other. Things don't make sense, characters do inexplicable things, new rules are written... it was maddening.

I enjoyed Force Awakens and Rogue One, I'm not irrationally attached to the original trilogy or anything. This movie missed for me by a lot.