I may reassess but my initial impression is that this wasn't good. The commentary about bloat are exactly right. There might be a fun, good 90-100 minute movie in here. But at 2.5 hours, it's kind of a slog. Leia space force glide, CGI llama escapes, and the overdone porgs were all straight out of the Prequel playbook of shlock and pretty garbagey.

If they cut the entire story arc of Finn and Rose going to Canto Bright to find the disposable DJ character they are eventually betrayed by -- that might fix a lot. The subplot about the mutiny with Poe and Holdo is pointless bloat; why doesn't Holdo just explain her plan to use the transports as a decoy? Poe bought into that once he was told! Another 5-10 minutes of scenes that don't add much.

Captain Phasma (assuming she's dead) still was hugely underused; seems like a Boba Fett knockoff -- here's a character with cool armor, you probably don't want to know much about her or see her do anything really, and there, now she's dead. The toy aisle is that way to get your Phasma gear and toys.

Speaking of not knowing much: I'm not an "every mystery needs to be explained to me" kinda guy but consider how much stuff they've thrown into the plot now over two movies that are basically unresolved and likely they are going to stuff into books and comics or whatever, or just never resolve:

- who that Lor San Tekka guy was, how did he know so much
- why was there even a map to Luke if he didn't want to be found
- how did Maz Kanata get that lightsaber
- who are the Knights of Ren? They looked cool, Snoke talked them up in TFA
- who is Snoke, does he have origins, how did he get Ben Solo to turn to the dark side

Instead it seems like they're just going to pile on MORE questions:

- are Rey's parents actually nobodies? Is her background truly not special? Remember in TFA, they invested tons of screen time into the idea Rey's background was meaningful; Ren freaks out when he hears a girl escaped, Snoke seems to be aware she might be someone important, she is called down to Maz's basement to touch the lightstaber and has visions, and it's hinted she was around for the fall of the new Jedi order somehow, that she had SOME connection to Luke and Obi Wan and Ben Solo. As best I can say, this one might actually be a useful storytelling device (e.g., hey duped audience, you thought only Skywalkers could be mighty with The Force, well we flipped that on its head, turns out anyone can be). I can buy into it if it really was a swerve.
- whose version of Luke/Ben's story about what happened to the new Jedi order is accurate

The Last Jedi thankfully didn't push boundaries there of using past-mysteries tropes to move the story along, but to me, leaving so much unresolved made TFA *less satisfying* in retrospect. TFA looks like a grabbag of tropes they don't plan to fully resolve. Future, repeat viewings are going to feel worse once you realize there's nothing to Maz Kanata and Snoke is really a sideshow villain.

The last thing I would say is that -- perhaps due to the knowledge of real world events where we know Carrie Fisher dies and Leia is unlikely to appear -- the world of characters and plotlines is now pretty small unless they really introduce a bunch of new arcs in Episode IX. I think that's largely a positive. And so still, I retain some hope the next episode is better. Luke, Han and presumably Leia are gone, perhaps ancillary force-ghost mentors, and mostly off screen. Snoke and Phasma are probably dead. The chessboard as it stands now are Rey, Finn, a half-developed Poe character (that Abrams reportedly almost killed off in TFA anyway), Rose (?) and a bunch of mascots and merchandising gimmicks on the Falcon, and Ren and whiny screech comic relief Hex on the bad guy side. This does give Abrams the chance to really focus on the smaller number of main characters and their relationships in the wrap-up movie. So I do think this can be salvaged. The series would be well-served by tighter stories with less ancillary characters and self-contained story arcs, and more focus on what the characters they've developed. If the true, real story arc of Episodes 7-9 is the interplay between Rey and Kylo Ren/Ben Solo and the payoff is some resolution to their story -- and that's REALLY the characters who develop and change throughout -- I'm OK with that. It would be better to deeply focus on that then have three or four story arcs that they have to resolve in 2 hours in Episode IX. You could imagine an alternative story with a more-sprawling set of characters that might fundamentally be worse than where they are now.

But in sum: loved The Force Awakens and thought it really set things up well, but was -- at least on first viewing -- disappointed and thought this was a step back.

I thought it was pretty bad and often comically bad. I would watch Blade Runner 2049 twenty times again before I rewatched TLJ, but I don't plan on ever watching TLJ again, anyways. Some of the posts above already captured my main gripes about the movie, although I think I found fewer redeeming elements. FWIW I liked both TFA and Rogue One and probably like 9+/10 movies I see at the theater (although mostly b/c I see very few).

In b4 a page of posters praising/defending the movie.

Some ancillary thoughts I couldn't edit in: Thought the acting and cinematography were top notch though. Luke / Poe / Rey / Kylo are all well done. I suspect Adam Driver's performance might be divisive but he's got the hardest character to play by far in this and I think he's probably been underrated.

Will eventually sit and listen to the score but it seemed mostly forgettable. Thought TFA's score was great (Rey's Theme, March of the Resistance stood out last time). At least on first listen during the film, there wasn't much there that was new or interesting in the score.

Agree with most of this. Certain aspects of the film (like the casino segment) were just Disney overload.

They’re setting up this trilogy masterfully in terms of attracting a new generation of fans. Still, it makes me a little sad that each successive film no matter how visually spectacular or breathtaking, will probably feel less familiar.

Man, maybe it's just reddit/twitter/etc. but ho boy the negative reactions are pretty visceral. I'm not surprised people dislike it, because it's pretty bad, but I thought it was just *kinda* bad. But people are losing their ****, lol. It wasn't THAT bad. It does seem like it has a small minority of vocal defenders who loved it.

I do question how this got a 94% or whatever on RT.

Also, they obviously listened to everyone who feared it would just be an Empire remake.

I agree completely. Originally when they gave Rian Johnson the new trilogy to himself I thought it must have been because he did an amazing job with this one; now I know it's because he proved to be good at making what are basically Marvel movies in space, which I'm sure is the kind of tone Disney wants going forward. Still a chance Abrams rescues the trilogy with a decent Episode IX, but eh.

It's Disney, $$$ is the most important factor in the equation for them. I can still rewatch the old Trilogy over and over and it's 30+ years old. I doubt I'll be rewatching any of the prequels or this trilogy in 20 years. The balls it took to make the original is just not there with disney or hollywood really. There's just a lot of dog**** being pumped out with Micheal Bay style of stuff (and I'm not hating on Bay style of movies) but you don't get great art like the original from that mentality or that money grubbing whore higher standard. The art is just not there in a lot of film making these days.

If you read the audience reviews, the first 80% or so are from before the release: people getting hyped up and giving it 5 stars. Obv try keeping your job as a movie critic when you trash a billion dollar movie or whatever it cost. I bet Avatar got good reviews too.

I'm not a film buff, but don't they usually go back and watch the movie after they shoot it, but before they release it, so that they can cut out/reshoot the bits that didn't work and leave in the good stuff? It seems like this movie would have benefited a lot from a process like that. A lot of the components are so, so good, but there's just huge swathes of the movie that are complete garbage.

I was thinking about that too, and I'm not sure what could have been done other than literally cutting everything except the main Jedi plotline and making the movie about an hour long. I don't think a single "component" from either the main battle plot or Finn's/Rose's plot worked for me.

I thought everything on Krait (except Rose) was good-to-excellent, so really you just need a First Order/Resistance plot for the first half of the movie that isn't a space version of this:

I'm mildly surprised that my sentiments are shared given the (seemingly?) overwhelming praise on the internet. I clicked through a lot of the RT reviews last night and they were glowing. even a site like The Ringer (who usually skewer this type of crap) had a wildly effusive piece

I definitely felt an unexpected longing for force awakens, a movie I saw once and sort of liked, despite its flaws.

Why can't anyone at disney script a decent plot? Rebel fleet of 3 ships being chased for 18 hours by a ship that can't manage to accelerate 3 more miles per hour? WTF

This was a central thing that took me out of the movie because it bothered me so much. TIE fighters are much faster than any of the capital ships, and they had already shown that by having Kylo and a couple of wingmen fly out and blast the bridge of one of the ships wide ****ing open (the aftermath of which resulted in one of the most cringeworthy moments of the movie, btw) with little trouble. I guess they were trying to explain it away with that line about "we can't cover you because you're too far out"? They couldn't just send a dozen or so grunts in TIEs out instead to do the same thing? Suddenly they care about every single pilot in their fleet?

amazing seinfeld tie-in

Krait was OK. there are way too many half-expository half-rousing, never give up speeches in these sequels and I think they had two on that planet. they someone managed to have zero in the original trilogy. the whole thing is an insult to intelligence, also **** marvel.

I've always looked at the OT as movies that kids could love but not specifically made for children (with the Ewok throw in being acknowledged). I mean they were action space dramas. A New Hope takes 45 minutes to get going - not made for 6 year olds. These movies, on the other hand, are obviously expressly manufactured for kids. Any ounce of grit that EVER might exist is sterilized along the DISNEY process. I already said it but riding space llama escape what the ****. How do people put up with this crap. Actually, nevermind disney you are right. They should have had Luke and Leia riding Ewoks during RoTJ and then a random 18 year old coder from the medical frigate explain to us why its morally wrong to treat Ewoks like horses. that would have been way better

People are talking about how gutsy Rian Johnson is by making a bloated mess of **** you haven't seen in a Star Wars movie before, but imagine the backbone of a director who edited a movie down to a brisk 80 minutes of entertaining scenes and important plot points.

See, now I'm getting annoyed so I'm just gonna keep ranting about different parts of the movie. Guess we're not bothering with spoilers for relatively minor stuff.

The very first battle set the stage for how lazy the battle/science logic was gonna be. After flying up and taunting Hux with 20th century language about holding on the line for him, and some sort of veiled "your mom" joke, he goes and single-handedly blasts every cannon on the deck of the dreadnaught (or whatever it's called) with no problem, because he's apparently proven this super-human ability to fly around under heavy fire with no cover, and not get picked off by some random blast.

Then they send out a bunch of the slowest bombers ever, which for some reason, even in the dead of space, have to fly directly over their target and passively drop their payloads using nonexistent "gravity". I'm not sure what's special about those explosives that they couldn't just be launched like proton torpedoes or something.

I was actually laughing at the speed of the bombers. You lost all of your ships, general? no **** they are giant and defenseless and fly 18mph

and we even got an added, visual version of the "Rousing speech that all hope is not lost and we must fight on" that every one of these movie has. Why am I emotionally invested in this random bomber that is (presumably?) using the force to get the trigger down. Ah, she's willing to suicide herself for the greater good blah blah blah just die already like Porkins

Plus they're not even cool looking for the toy aisle. The Lego version of those will be on clearance in a couple of months.

think i'm appreciating the movie even more after reading the grumpy comments here. y'all sound like old crotchety men. this movie went back to the pulpy roots of the original star wars, definitely light years better than jj's bland and completely safe directorial take on the movie.

cannot relate at all to ppl who hold the view that Ep7 was better than Ep8. Rogue One better than Ep8 I could see, but that's a different style of movie, one that takes itself very seriously and that movie works in its own way. But Ep7...that is just serviceable karaoke...it wasn't a bad movie, but it wasn't much more than a safe placesetter that took 0 risks with the material.

yes ep8 went off the rogue one/ep7 reservation here in the same way that thor ragnarok did the same with the avengers series. and if it came as a surprise, the director rian johnson basically put a huge megaphone into your ear in the opening scene where Poe is making fun of Hux and told you point blank this is not going to be ep7 & this is not going to be the prequel trilogy.

deriding the movie as for kids, or because of the campy humor, is kinda just echoing the original criticisms of '77 star wars. it's a justified point of view, but it is also missing the point. this is a pulpy fantasy story with space wizards and showdowns and quests and rogues and nazi-level villains. the movie is very fun, just go with it.

I mean, it's all good, I'm glad you liked it. Obviously a lot of people did.

I just think that when talking about fun and pulpy, there's a difference between, say...Han trying to have an intelligent conversation with a Death Star officer and blasting the comm when he runs out of things to say, and BB-8 being mistaken for a slot machine in a casino and then a few scenes later spitting the coins out to knock out a bunch of prison guards. The former always made me laugh (both now and upon original watch at the age of 7), and the latter made me want to hide under my seat from embarrassment.

And that's where I beg to differ when it comes to your point that
...because the prequels were just full of that kind of cheeseball **** that is exclusively for the under-10 crowd to appreciate. I thought the humor in eps 4-7 was stuff that would neither go over anyone's head nor make them cringe.

eh, I'm not on board with your point really. There's a clear distinction between a movie that kids can enjoy/love and a movie made for kids.

and there's a difference between pulpy and stupid. R2D2 playing space chess vs. Chewbacca = pulpy. BB-88 mowing down stormtroopers from an ATST = stupid. And dumb story-writing is dumb no matter who the movie is designed for. I was so annoyed when I found out that the Vice Admiral had been holding back her cloaking plan for literally no reason at all. Wouldn't have had a mutinty, wouldn't have sent Finn and Rose to space Monaco (well I guess then we wouldn't have gotten Disney's take on animal rights), definitely wouldn't have Benecio Del Toro sell out the cloaking to the Empire. Seems like bad management (or writing).

oh also why did Vice Admiral Purple Hair wait until fifteen transports got vaporized to decide to hyperspeed into the star destroyer. I put that together in like 20 seconds and I'm not a vice admiral.

A pulpy fun jaunt through the galaxy for kids should not be 2.5 hours long, have 3 competing story arcs, 5 sidekicks, 4 main characters, etc. It's bloated. "Johnson did the avant garde Star Wars movie we never knew we wanted...you know, the airy fun one for kids" is inherently contradictory but I think absolutely gets to the point.

He DID make a fun movie for kids. There was like an hour of cute CGI animal escaping and the kid with the broom and porgs. Definitely mashed in some kid appeal.

Along with a return to the great space battles of Star Wars past.

Also the return of campy comedy, just like in the pulp comics.

And a subtle love story between Rose and Finn, if you sort of forget about the alternate background love story between Finn and Rey, which I guess might just be Platonic.

And it's a chase movie, and a war movie, about a badass pilot who mutinies against his commanders only to discover the wisdom of his commanders after all.

And a deep psychological noir and philisiophical examination of Rey and Kylo Ren and the moral ambiguity of the Jedi Order.

All of that, in one move. Something for everyone.

what about children with chronic stuttering looking for a role model?

I was waiting for him to say he'll flip ya, flip ya for real.