Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker: Light vs. Dark, Two Battling Reviews
The Light Side - Jack Fenner
Being the ninth and final episode in the Skywalker saga, The Rise of Skywalker (2019) aims to please as the series comes to a close. After the failure of The Last Jedi, director JJ Abrams had a lot to make up for and he does not disappoint.
The characters that we have been following since 2015 with the release of The Force Awakens make their last appearance to close out the series. With regards to these characters, this movie does a fantastic job of bringing their stories to a close. An example of this can be found in the main character Rey discovering that she is the granddaughter of Emperor Palpatine, but after she rejects this name and takes on the name of Skywalker, we see that her heart lies with the Jedi. Although she takes on this name at the end of the movie, her yellow lightsaber is a symbol of Rey bringing balance to the force by starting something different from the Jedi or the Sith— an answer to a question that fans have been waiting for for a long time.
One of the reasons that this movie is getting such bad reviews is that some of this fan pleasing moments (such as the yellow lightsaber) were not well received by critics. Some claim it takes away from the plot of the movie, but I would argue that the fan pleasing was a necessary aspect of the final movie. Star Wars has been around for 42 years, and I believe that, if the final movie were not to be filled with satisfying and nostalgic moments for the true fans, it would be a disservice to those who had spent all that time falling in love with the series.
Critics also claim The Rise of Skywalker suffers from fast pacing, which may be true, but is not necessarily a bad thing. The Rise of Skywalker was given a lot to deal with after the missteps of the last movie and it had to handle these things in a quick fashion. Even though it is quick, it ties up the story in a creative and interesting way. Too many people walking into The Rise of Skywalker are expecting it to be just as bad or worse than its predecessor before they even make it to their seats. If it’s watched closely, you will see the creative routes the movie takes to tie up questions we have had throughout the trilogy.
It's no secret that The Rise of Skywalker is getting very poor reviews from critics around the world, but if you look a little closer on Rotten Tomatoes you will see that the audience score is at an 86%. This score speaks for itself, The Rise of Skywalker was made for the people who have been closely following Star Wars from the beginning, not the critics.
The Dark Side - Connor Draper
Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker shows that more does not equal better. All the characters are bland and boring, some of them even just being plot conveniences. As an example, one important character just appears in the movie to tell Rey where to go. The plot only jumps from place to place based on these conveniences, and ignores much of the Star Wars lore, like the fact that Emperor Palpatine could destroy a planet with Force Storm, yet his equal is Rey, who could barely destroy a Tie Fighter with one swing and couldn’t control her force powers. There are also many loose plot threads and character arcs that were never resolved by the end of the movie. A great example would be Finn, who, despite being one of the main characters of the seventh movie, isn’t shown with a definitive ending to his arc. The acting is good, for the most part, but the dialogue just doesn’t work well and leaves a lot to be desired. The dialogue shows the characters’ thoughts and emotions without any subtlety. There were at least fifty times when someone would yell “No!” or “Yes!” instead of showing it through acting prowess. There are also very cliche lines of dialogue like, “Long I have waited,” and “It’s your destiny.” The last thing is that the editing is terrible. Some scenes lasted just a second, then there would be a screen wipe, leaving you with the feeling of, “Why?”
Whether or not you like this movie depends on your taste in films. As for me, I did not like this movie. It was messy and inconsistent in many ways, and just didn’t feel right. Because of this, I give this movie a three out of ten.