Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker

It was an almost impossible task: finding the perfect way to not only conclude the Star Wars sequel trilogy, but also the entire 42-year, 9-film Skywalker Saga. While not all of the ideas in The Rise of Skywalker land perfectly, overall it’s packed full of heart and honours the emotional core of the series, giving it perhaps as good a send-off as could realistically be hoped for.

Premise:  A mysterious broadcast announces that the Sith Lord Emperor Palpatine (Ian McDiarmid), thought killed during the Battle of Endor a generation ago, is alive and amassing an army the likes of which the galaxy has never seen.  Kylo Ren (Adam Driver), Supreme Leader of the First Order, seeks to find this new threat to his authority, while Finn (John Boyega) and Poe Dameron (Oscar Isaac) travel to meet with a spy within the First Order. Meanwhile General Organa (Carrie Fisher) leads the remnants of the Resistance that survived the Battle of Crait, while also continuing Rey’s (Daisy Ridley) Jedi training.

Review:

It’s a fairly uncontroversial statement to say that Star Wars: The Last Jedi was a controversial film.  Some viewers, myself included, applauded it for breaking all the storytelling “rules” and taking the Star Wars series in an unexpected and unpredicted direction, while others disliked it for precisely the same reasons.  What is clear, is that the makers of The Rise of Skywalker took the “fan backlash” (and that phrase is intentionally in air-quotes) to heart, and have (for better or worse) taken far fewer creative chances with this concluding Episode.

This is almost painfully obvious right from the opening crawl, the first line of which announces the return of Emperor Palpatine (Ian McDiarmid).  While The Last Jedi went to great lengths to distinguish the Kylo Ren/Snoke relationship from the Darth Vader/Emperor template, and to give Kylo Ren (Adam Driver) an identity outside of being a Sith apprentice, the opening 5 minutes of The Rise of Skywalker effectively resets all of that.  Similarly, after The Last Jedi resolved the mystery of Rey’s parentage in such an emotionally devastating, unpredictable and inventive way, The Rise of Skywalker very quickly suggests that there is still more to reveal about Rey’s origin.

“…the sequel trilogy feels very disjointed with no overarching sense of cohesion…”

These are just two (admittedly glaring) examples of how the sequel trilogy feels very disjointed with no overarching sense of cohesion, as a result of different directors and writers taking the sequel trilogy in various different directions during their respective tenures.  While there were certainly benefits to giving each writing/directing team the creative freedom to try something different, the lack of oversight and the absence of a pre-planned storyline for the sequel trilogy leaves it feeling the most fragmented part of the Skywalker Saga.  To put it bluntly, it really shows that they were making this up as they went along.

But leaving all that aside, there is still plenty to enjoy in The Rise of Skywalker, if you choose to focus on what it is, rather than what it could have been.  For example, I’m not sure that bringing the Emperor back was, creatively speaking, a good idea, because it does feel like a creative step backwards (it might have been different if clues had been seeded throughout The Force Awakens and The Last Jedi that Palpatine was still alive, but it’s clear that this was just an idea that they came up with for The Rise of Skywalker).  It’s also important to bear in mind that J.J. Abrams is not always that concerned with providing explanations for all of his plot developments; so just as how in The Force Awakens he never explained how the First Order had been created or who Snoke was, you shouldn’t necessarily expect a detailed explanation for the Emperor’s return in The Rise of Skywalker either.

“…there’s loads to love once you accept it for what it is…”

That said, once you make peace with the fact that they’ve decided to bring the Emperor back from the dead, there is an undeniable thrill to be had in seeing Ian McDiarmid return to the saga to chew up the scenery as the iconic villain.  And there is some logic to bringing him back (the filmmakers said they couldn’t think of another film series where the villain from the first six films is absent from the last three) - I just wish it was a creative decision that they’d made back when they were planning The Force Awakens, so that it could feel more organic rather than tacked on.

But the return of the Emperor is a perfect example of how there’s loads to love about The Rise of Skywalker once you accept it for what it is, rather than what you might have liked it to be.  Ian McDiarmid is fantastic (as ever) and brings a sense of threat and menace that none of the other characters in the Star Wars universe could ever quite match.  J.J. Abrams films the Emperor’s scenes with menacing shadows broken up by flashes of violent lightning, creating arguably the scariest moments of the entire saga so far.

“…it’s a joy to see Poe, Finn and Rey working together as a team…”

The cast are universally great, having really become one with their characters over the course of the sequel trilogy.  Oscar Isaac has arguably never been more fun to spend time with as Poe Dameron, and it’s a joy to see the core triumvirate of Poe, Finn and Rey working together as a team for so much of the film (after The Force Awakens just teamed up Finn with Rey, and The Last Jedi paired Finn with Poe).  Seeing the trio together, alongside Chewbacca of course, on the Millennium Falcon brings to mind the camaraderie shared by Luke, Leia and Han in the original trilogy, which is fantastic to see finally.  John Boyega makes Finn feel like a character who’s finally found his place in the universe, after having been driven by his fears for so much of the last two films, while Daisy Ridley continues to do a lot of the sequel trilogy’s heavy-lifting as the reluctant heir to the Jedi Order.

Ridley does a great job of conveying Rey’s fear of her own power, giving Rey’s arc a very different feel from Luke’s arc in the original trilogy.  Whereas Luke was confident in his abilities (as shown during his interactions with Yoda in The Empire Strikes Back) and was adamant that there was still good in Vader, Rey is the opposite – desperate for help and guidance in The Last Jedi, and now consumed by her visions that she is destined to turn to the Dark Side.  The scenes between Rey and Kylo Ren are, just as in The Last Jedi, some of the strongest in the series, and Adam Driver is once again brilliant and nuanced as he captures the former Ben Solo’s internal conflict.

“…a love-letter to, and celebration of, the entire ‘Star Wars’ universe…”

The Rise of Skywalker also marks Carrie Fisher’s final appearance in the saga, having sadly passed away after filming The Last Jedi.  Miraculously, there was enough leftover footage of her (primarily from The Force Awakens) that J.J. Abrams was able to convincingly weave her into the storyline for The Rise of Skywalker, albeit in a more limited capacity.  The rest of the supporting cast from the earlier films are also back, and this time are also joined by newcomers Richard E. Grant as First Order Allegiant General Pryde, Keri Russell as an old contact of Poe’s, and Naomi Ackie as a mysterious new character who shares a history with Finn.  There are also a few cameos from familiar faces (and voices), including the return of Billy Dee Williams to the role of Lando Calrissian for the first time in 36 years.

Despite its flaws (which largely all relate to the disjointed nature of the sequel trilogy), The Rise of Skywalker is a heartfelt tribute to the entire Skywalker Saga, and there are many moments of pure joy throughout the 2 hours, 20 minutes runtime.  J.J. Abrams manages to bring together all of the best elements from The Force Awakens (in particular, the character relationships, the emotional connections between the generations, and the recapturing of the tone and magic from the original trilogy), but this time the plot doesn’t feel like a straightforward carbon copy of any of the earlier Episodes.  In fact, while there are a few very superficial structural similarities between The Rise of Skywalker and Return of the Jedi, the plot of this final Episode feels the least like any of the plots from the earlier instalments.

“…brings the saga to an emotionally satisfying conclusion with a message of hope…”

From beginning to end, The Rise of Skywalker is a love-letter to, and celebration of, the entire Star Wars universe.  Sometimes, this is arguably to the film’s detriment (for example, a meta-joke involving Chewbacca falls flat and really takes you out of the film) - but for the most part, it brings the saga to an emotionally satisfying conclusion, with a message of hope that has always been at the heart of the Star War mythos.