Spoiler (click to reveal)
-Snoke. Snoke finally took on a menace that I felt was lacking in TFA. And he seemed to possess more power than even Palpatine.
-Character development. As I mentioned before, Johnson moved the saga in the right direction by building up the core characters more. I still think there is work to be done, but it was a good step.
-Force bond: I thought that was a really neat way to build on the Ren/Rey connection.
-Yoda: It’s always great to see him again. I was hoping to see other Force ghosts as well, but alas.
-The Resistance. The Resistance feels more like a ragtag, desperate group than the Rebel Alliance did in the original films, or even the Resistance in TFA.
Spoiler (click to reveal)
-Time: It was confusing for me to figure out how soon this movie happened after TFA. The opening crawl seemed to suggest that there had been more battles as the First Order was crushing the Resistance, but after the big space battle at the start of the film, it jumps right to Rey handing the lightsaber to Luke. It felt like there should have been more passage of time than that, time enough to allow the First Order to regroup after losing Starkiller Base.
-Plot: There wasn’t a lot of story in this movie that was two hours and thirty minutes. And I felt some of it was tacked on just because of that running time and also to stuff it with more action and ‘humor’ scenes.
-Humor: Some was fine, but some was too contemporary and done for an immediate cheap laugh. I also think some was meant to be a bit shocking or daring, or to make the story feel more unpredictable than it really was. I also think the film was at times too self-aware for its own good.
-First Order: The opening crawl sets them up as being more formidable than they were in TFA. But the first scene shows them to be pretty incompetent and that doesn’t change for most of the film. I don’t buy Hux as a great general. In fact, TLJ decided to go the comedy route with him, weakening him even further. I thought Kylo Ren was better handled this time around, but still I’m not buying him as a leader. He’s still got to get his weight up. Also, the First Order’s tendency to play with the Resistance instead of crushing them when they have the chance just made them look even more weaker. Their behavior felt more plot dictated than organic.
-Snoke’s demise. While his death was a nice surprise and the way he went was pretty cool, I felt this was ultimately a waste of a character. There was really nothing to him because the film didn’t explain who he was or where he came from before axing him. So all he remains is a low-rent Palpatine. And that sucks because the film was building him up to be very powerful in the Force. However, his powers-like many Jedi throughout the saga-are very plot dictated. I had read a rumor before seeing the film that Snoke was possibly the first Jedi. That is not revealed in the film, but I wish they had gone that route since they ruled out Darth Plageuis. With Snoke gone there isn’t a really strong villain for the next film.
-Poe: He was way too rash. Perhaps Disney feels it needs to fill the role of Han Solo, but I felt that Dameron was at times too pushy.
-Finn: Johnson did better by Finn than Abrams. That being said, there was still the broad comedy that was at Finn’s expense, he still kept getting taken down in fights, mostly by women in a way to emasculate him. Another way that was done was with the character Rose. Rose was often bossing him around and then she denied him his big sacrificial moment, the time when he had fully shed his fear of the First Order. The plus side is that she cares for him, said she loved him, and even kissed him, but I did notice that she’s the forceful one more so than him. Finn was still Rey crazy at first, but that was tempered somewhat. And I thought it was interesting when they showed Rey watching as Finn was checking in on an injured Rose. I couldn’t read her expression. I can’t say it was jealousy on Rey’s part, but perhaps satisfaction that Finn had found someone, or that maybe he would stop hounding her. And Finn finally got a big win on Phasma, a pretty much unqualified win, so that was pretty cool.
-Rey’s parents: I hope it’s just a fake out, but the reveal that Rey’s parents were nobodies just felt anticlimactic. So much speculation had been built up over that, especially because of TFA’s focusing on it, and TLJ focused on it as well.
-Canto Blight: The casino world that Finn and Rose go to just felt like padding. And the alien designs weren’t that interesting.
-DJ: Though Benecio Del Toro added a stutter to his performance-something I don’t recall any Star Wars character having before-I was hoping for more with his character. And there might be in the next film, but I wish it had been more here. As it stands, he was there to show that both the Resistance and First Order had bloody hands and to betray Finn and Rose. But we never got the change of heart that we did with Lando. And that perhaps was Johnson trying to flip things again, but doing what was unexpected.
-Vice Admiral Holdo. I think they wasted Laura Dern in this role. I also didn’t like that she wasn’t in a uniform. She was dressed more like a Senator. I wish they had made her a First Order admiral or something instead. And she was there to also to flip expectations, sacrificing herself in a scene that normally would’ve had Leia doing it.
-I’m iffy on Luke here. I can see why Mark Hamill had some issues with Rian Johnson’s take on his character. I will give points that the film does lay out why Luke went into exile, providing some reasoning for it. Still I wish that they had went another route with him. And it sucks that we so far have never really seen Luke just cut loose with that lightsaber. Also, the scene with Luke drinking alien breast milk was very unneeded.
-Lightsaber battles: The best was a team-up of Rey and Ren versus Snoke’s bodyguards. It wasn’t the greatest fight in the saga, but it was decent and had at least one cool moment to it. And it was a lightsaber fight that was badly needed. I think the sequel trilogy is trying to go for the less action, more emotion of the original films’ lightsaber battles, but the characters haven’t earned that yet. The battle between Ren and Luke was a disappointment, but I get why they went that route.
-Space battles: The space battles weren’t the best here. There was a good heroic last stand on the desert planet at the end, but for the most part the space combat scenes are not going to be hallmarks of the saga.
-Bigger is not always better. I think one of the many problems with the sequels is just having bigger starships, bigger weapons, etc. And it’s not just about that. I mean Rogue One’s Krennic, a bureaucrat, radiated more menace than Hux. It’s not about the position, it’s about the actors, the material they are given, and the tone. I still feel that too many of the new sequel characters are just kids playing dress up.
