There have been a lot of posts and articles out there about the film that represents the end of the Skywalker Saga. And here’s the thing: they are all true! And then some!!
It is such a fucking shitty movie. You will laugh a lot at how shitty it is though, and laughter is good. Civilization will end in the next 50-60 years due to climate devastation. We need to be able to laugh! And this film will make you laugh.
So, you should assume that whenever this movie is playing, something bad is happening. That being said, there are a handful of moments in it that are in fact Actually Good. I will eventually splice them together and call it “The Actually Good Cut.” It will be about two minutes long.
SPOILERS ARE AHEAD BUT REALLY WHO CARES IT IS THAT BAD
1. Billy Dee Williams still very good and still very horny!
Billy Dee just teleports in and out of the film in a completely inexplicable manner. This would normally be something called a “plot hole,” but in this black hole of a film, his presence was such a welcome relief from the tedium. Lando was always just…cool. And he was still cool here! The fact that his coolness remained intact is a testament to Billy Dee given how botched so much of the film was.
2. Harrison Ford is also still very good and thankfully was not a force ghost in his cameo.
Listen, I really love Star Wars. A part of loving something though is accepting it for it is. And Star Wars was mostly good because they were weird space movies with PRIME HARRISON FUCKING FORD starring in them. Even the less inspired outings like Return of the Jedi and The Force Awakens managed to be quite fun in large part due to HARRISON FORD being a major part of them. He’s just very good, and it is the ultimate Harrison Ford role. He could play it in his sleep forever. His cameo here were would have been more affecting in a better film, but the scene was a welcome reprieve.
3. Adam Driver managed to salvage a few scenes.
There are a number of scenes that Driver is quite good in. In a film paced horrendously with no one getting a properly developed arc and where genuine characterization was sacrificed for attempts at dehumanized pithy dialogue, Driver often felt like an Actual Human Being. It was reminiscent of the prequels in how only Neeson and McGregor were able to scrape together some moments of appearing like a person.
Anyway, the highlight of Driver’s work here was when he was making a desperate scramble to help Rey destroy her grandfather (don’t ask, please don’t ask). Despite being able to stop lasers with his mind, he’s reduced to base jumping onto a giant chain (?) and then says, “Ouch.” No one else in this film could pull this off. Give this man a million Oscars.
4. Whoops, I tried think of a fourth thing, but I could only think of three!
This film is truly horrendous. There’s really nothing to discuss about it. There’s no really point breaking it down. If this film was just any blockbuster, everyone would ignore it. There’s no reason to get even invested in what went wrong, because it all went wrong. It’s kind of like Seasons 7 & 8 of Game of Thrones in that the conclusion is so poorly executed that you will lose all appetite for more stories told from the world. We can all move on with our lives.
The Reel World 