The Rise of Skywalker: Discussion

"Sith goth-metal concert." - Ingram

You nailed it, dude. That's why I love that shit. Plus Palpatine is trying to do this weird-ass ritual and I enjoy a good ritual. It is the same reason I love the climax of Hereditary.

Well I just signed on to YouTube and was greeted with this top suggestion

I tried to watch this movie for the first time today, and couldn't get past the first 20 minutes. The movie jumps all over the place and it's almost hard to follow what is going on. It scrambles all over the place to salvage some plot threads so there can be a movie. It is so obvious that they tried to course correct after TLJ. It's been talked to death, but I still can't believe they didn't have any plans for the trilogy after throwing out Lucas' stories. How hard would it have been to put Dave Filoni and Jon Favreau in charge since the beginning? They hired two directors who have no idea what Star Wars is about. JJ Abrams thinks Star Wars is just a space western, and his knowledge of Star Wars probably begins and ends with the cantina scene which he brazenly imitated. The less said about Rian Johnson, the better. 

The movie starts out with freaking slow-mo. It looked like a parody since the first frames. The opening crawl is a joke. "The dead speak"? Kylo is killing some people for some reason to get something that looks kind of like a Sith holocron. What is this place? Then he's got the thing plugged to his ship and heads to a planet where Palpatine, who has "somehow" returned (I guess this was revealed in a Fortnite game), gives some quick exposition to try and haphazardly tie the irreconcilable visions of Abrams and Johnson together. There's no dramatic reveal of Palpatine, he just starts spouting this nonsense to Kylo about being the voice in his head and having cloned Snoke or whatever. Did they really have to bring Palpatine into this after Johnson's stunt of killing Snoke? Maul survived being cut in half, so why not Snoke? Or reveal that Snoke was actually Plagueis and immortal. Anything but randomly bringing back Palpatine. 

I couldn't get past the scene with the rebels heading off to somewhere. Abrams' characters talk and act like hyperactive kids on a sugar rush. He saw the part in Empire when the Millennium Falcon crew shout a lot and talk over each other because they're in a dangerous situation, and thought that it would be fun to have characters act like that almost all the time.

This were my thoughts exactly while watching TRoS. I think TFA is definitely like Jurassic World, a soft-reboot, and that's why I don't care for it. I liked Fallen Kingdom's gloomier atmosphere, and I would liken that film to both TLJ and TRoS. In my opinion, Jurassic Park 3 is underrated and like the prequels of the Jurassic Park series. The original Jurassic Park and The Lost World are like the OT.

A wonderful tetralogy of posts, Seeker of the Whills ! I'm really sorry I didn't get back to this thread sooner.

So much to cover!


Oh, man...

It's hard to know where to begin with this post! This may have been your real opinion at the time, but it's also an excellent parody of fan complaining. An amusing philippic. 

Even though it stands for itself, I'd just like to focus in on something here:


Right. TROS is an odd duck of a movie, and quite a surprise for a "final" installment. It attempts to perform some sexual healing of this 'ere Sequel Trilogy, and its narrative is not unlike the shattered Death Star Throne Room window. But that's cool.

This person on Reddit presents a good summary of the situation:

www.reddit.com/r/StarWarsCantina/comments/hzc6km/how_i_learned_to_love_the_rise_of_skywalker/


Some replies in the same thread take a similar view, such as this one:

www.reddit.com/r/StarWarsCantina/comments/hzc6km/how_i_learned_to_love_the_rise_of_skywalker/fzi15ix/


The OP himself elaborates in a reply (I've highlighted the key sentence):

www.reddit.com/r/StarWarsCantina/comments/hzc6km/how_i_learned_to_love_the_rise_of_skywalker/fzi6o5k/


Indeed, this sort of viewpoint on TROS is not confined solely to Reddit. For instance, in this excellent video review of the movie from YouTuber Maj0r Lee, posted on April 10th 2020:



The narrator pronounces:


He continues:


To steal Lee's expression, the jampacked nature of the film is the point. It's that way by design. In a matter of minutes, all the main characters are shown doing something in a fast-paced, accelerated way. There's Kylo mowing down the mushroom men on Mustafar and then lead-footing it to Exegol in the opening sequence, there's Finn and Poe at Sinta Glacier and then Poe putting the Millennium Falcon into overdrive and "lightspeed skipping" through several environments (much to the chagrin of Finn, Chewie, and Rey when she finds out), and finally there's Rey, who ironically begins her scene in a peaceful, serene way, but quickly becomes frustrated and runs a makeshift Jedi decathlon on Ajan Kloss, going full-pelt through the jungle as she sweats out her annoyance at her own limitations. She trips over when an ironically calm Kylo starts harassing her through the Force, then is subjected to a fast-paced Force vision. Even the ensuing banter between Rey and Poe is incredibly rapid-fire. It's a lot to take in, especially on a first viewing. But as Lee says, it's also very fun. The energy of TROS really surprised me after the much more lethargic pacing of TFA and TLJ. It really stands out and commits to its hypertensive nature 100%. That's something I really admire about it. 

And yes, as a consequence, as Lee says: all these other things pop out. In other words, the film is like a never-ending hailstorm of Easter Eggs, and all the more engaging as a result. I think JJ and his team risked discombobulating people to give them an exceptionally crisp and vivid experience. In a way, TFA was his OT movie (as you basically said), while TROS is his PT installment. Think about it. Not only are the prequels blatantly referenced in the opening crawl ("the phantom Emperor"), but the first planet we see, the planet that opens the film, is Mustafar. Then, when Kylo discovers the Emperor in his secret lair, Palpatine throws a classic line from ROTS right at him and the audience.

But I mean that TROS is JJ's prequel movie in another way.

In "The Beginning", core Lucasfilm employees sit down for a rough cut screening of TPM, and Lucas remarks immediately after the screening, still in the darkened auditorium: "It's a little disjointed." Ben Burtt muses: "It seems like a lot of short scenes." Lucas then famously concedes: "It's bold in terms of jerking people around, but... (shaking his head)... I may have gone too far in a few places." Burtt then points out that several story developments with clashing emotional tones happen "in the space of about ninety seconds", adding, "It's a lot in a very short time." A short time later, Rick McCallum, Ben Burtt, and Lucas are discussing the rough cut in a kitchen area. McCallum reminds them that the original Star Wars also started in an intense way, with the audience initially thrown off-balance, struggling to keep up. Lucas responds: "I know. I do a particular kind of movie, which this is consistent (with). But it is a very hard movie to follow, and at the same time, I've done it a little more extremely than I've ever done in the past." Lucas doubles down and rationalises the end product, but suggests they can at least soften things: "It's stylistically designed to be that way and you can't undo that. But we can diminish the effects of it."

I get the feeling JJ re-watched that exchange before making TROS and decided he would try to make his own version -- to, in effect, embrace what Lucas slightly shrinks away from at the end of that exchange, bringing to realisation a Star Wars movie that is the first of its type: a deliberately paralysing, feverish film, full of lush extremes and absurdities, such that those extremes and absurdities are themselves the chaotic realisation of themes, character arcs, critical lore details, and a final-chapter celebration of the endless unrealised possibilities of Star Wars itself. Back when promoting TFA, Abrams spoke about his love affair with the original movie, suggesting one of the biggest draws about the original film was its depiction of a world far bigger than the one you're actually shown. I believe he tried to capture this same sensation in TROS. Many things happen and are skipped over, hinting at much more colossal and subtle happenings outside of the immediacy of the experience. He may have tried to capture this same thing in TFA, but I personally believe he was far more successful at it in TROS.

Rey's parents, for example -- teased relentlessly throughout the trilogy -- are finally shown, but only briefly in flashback. Palpatine is resurrected, but we don't see how. He tries to possess Rey, but the bizarre ritual and the chanting of his Sith acolytes is unexplained. Kylo suddenly possesses all the shards of his destroyed helmet and has a strange-looking ape creature restore them. The Knights of Ren -- are they actually "ghouls", as one stormtrooper describes them? How does Lando manage to convince so many ships to amass at Exegol? How do they even arrive there? Is the Death Star wreckage even real or just a contorted, liminal space? Who made the Sith wayfinders? How was Exegol discovered? Who is that old woman who asks Rey for her full name at the end? Was Leia truly alive after the mid-point of the trilogy anymore? How did Rey and Kylo manage to pass objects to one another during their brief moments of connection? The Force Dyad? Okay, but how did that come about? Where do the Jedi voices come from? What is the true nature of the Force? TROS deliberately generates questions and is comfortable not giving concrete, closed-loop answers. A lot of people have chosen to see that as a serious failing of the movie, but I see it as a strength.    
 
It's remarkable that Star Wars lasted eight films, then found itself packing stuff in at the very end! Another failing, people say. But I say it speaks to the peculiar richness of the saga overall. It's not the usual way to conclude a story, but it feels oddly satisfying here. ROTJ didn't have half the tasty Force jam of TROS. I've said it before and I'll say it again: there's something "New Age Star Wars" about TROS that none of the other movies quite have. I think it's the only sequel movie, in a lot of ways, that feels like, well... a sequel movie.

I like the attitude of these fans:

www.reddit.com/r/StarWarsCantina/comments/j996la/i_rewatched_the_rise_of_skywalker_todayand_i/g8ih5u2/


www.reddit.com/r/StarWarsCantina/comments/j996la/i_rewatched_the_rise_of_skywalker_todayand_i/g8ikmu0/


If nothing else, TROS is the one Star Wars movie that allows your imagination to run riot, trying to make sense of its fractal approach. Otherwise, I think the saga only has that in totality. Thus, TROS is a bit like the frosting on the cake. I guess, in addition to its colourful energy, I love the intense sci-fi overtones. Star Wars pushed to breaking point. 

Rey: You can't lightspeed skip the Falcon!
Poe: Actually, turns out you can.  

Bit of a post-script, but look what I mean. Here's a typical bit of critique that misses the mark (by obviating itself with the very answer it offers but immediately denies):

www.reddit.com/r/StarWars/comments/l64hio/why_i_love_the_rise_of_skywalker/gky3o8b/


"Impossible. Perhaps the archives are incomplete."

with care and indeed affection
turning the pages patiently
in search of meanings

-- "Inheritance", W.S. Merwin

Good! Use your aggressive feelings, boy. Let the hate flow through you.


I think it is a discombobulating movie. The energy of the film, its helter-skelter pacing, its guttural bag of tricks -- these things, I think, are designed to jolt your senses. After the leisurely, prosaic pacing and tone of TFA, and the dour, self-indulgent mood and posturing of TLJ, you get something a little more zesty and Star Wars-y at the end. TROS seems to delight in its pastiche-driven style, and in its main shock hook of having Palpatine back.

That's something I really dig about it.

TROS knows what it is and just runs with it. It's a glammed-up B-movie. There's a real sense of propulsive, urgent fun about the whole thing. And yet actual themes and cogent trajectories for the characters at the same time. These ingredients speak to why I see it as the best of the sequel movies. All in all, it's the most satisfying Star Wars thing Disney has yet put out, in my opinion. It's the only one that combines beauty, whimsy, exhilaration, and metaphysical implications in near-perfect balance with one another -- and in that irresistible "saga" wrapper.

It also looks and sounds awesome. On a technical level, it's superbly made. It is creatively much more fecund than the other sequel movies, even though it still bears the stain of how the ST started out, and still has plenty of recycling and rehashing going on. But you can sit and watch it and be placed in quiet rapture at the giddy excessiveness of it all. It doesn't feel stale. It feels alive. "It's alive! It's alive!" Yes, Lucas is to blame for blatantly -- yet brilliantly -- homaging the James Whale adaptation of "Frankenstein" in the Birth of Vader scene in ROTS, and TROS then one-ups The Maker by literally bringing a Frankensteinian Palpatine to the screen. There is a sense, at the end, that something truly has come to life in the sequels -- finally! -- in its third and final chapter. Even while coasting on past glories. I love that. 


I think you're right that the film is challenging. There's a new aesthetic quality to appreciate here. A bracing dynamic. 

Anyway...

Take your time. It's good to have you back.