Episode 452: The Rise of Skywalker
Season Finale: A Special Edition
POP CULTURE SPIRIT WOW
Thoughts I had during Rise of Skywalker:
Wow, J.J. Abrams really did not like Last Jedi, did he?
J.J. Abrams’ version of Yes, And-ing: “No.”
The overall planning for this trilogy is like every complaint viewers had about the plotlines of Lost revisited. (They even included Charlie!)
I feel like this movie had as many planets featured as all the other movies combined. I kind of love it, but can we just take a breath at some point?
So they basically cut out Rose and then created a new woman of color who has almost the same back story – former slave, good with tech, rides horses hangs out with Finn … Maybe it’s time to have someone other than middle aged or old white guys writing and directing Star Wars movies?
Chewie crying about Leia’s death was everything.
Rey being forced in the very last line of the film to say her name is Skywalker now is like when a script makes an actor say the name of the movie in their dialogue. AWKWARD.
At this point Rise has been out for a couple weeks, and it’s already been dissected to death. I wrote this piece about it for America on its themes and some of its struggles.
The Rise people have also been out of force, trying to do damage control. Co-writer Chris Terrio was interviewed by Hollywood Reporter earlier this week. I can only read a little bit of it at a time, as things like his explanations for the lack of Rose is just crazy-making. But the questions being asked are excellent; Brian Davids does a great job.
(I see HR also did an interview with Rose actress Kelly Marie Tran. It’s great, too.)
Rather than rehash all that, here’s a bunch of different kinds of things I’ve been thinking about since seeing the film.
The Absolute Best: Leia
While I have a ton of problems with the Rise script, keeping Leia around for most of the film, and then using her death the way they did…amazing. And even with so little to work with, she still plays such an important role in Rey’s life.
(Also love that Rey sports a very Young Leia-like outfit, hoodie and all. Great choice.)
Five Best New Additions:
New Force powers – We can pass stuff across space! We can heal people or suck the life out of them! We can lightning bolt the entire hemisphere! I loved it all.
The only thing I wish is that they had somehow slowed The Mandalorian’s release so that Baby Yoda was not healing someone for the first time the very same week that they were going to make that a central plot point of this movie. Such a weird glitch.
Finn is Force Sensitive – While so much of Rise feels like JJ decided to ignore Jedi like it was Nikki and Paolo of Star Wars movies (Lost Deep Cut Powers Activate!), one continuation from Awakens that I’m glad Abrams went for was the idea that there was something more to Finn’s initial wake-up call. That moment was clearly played like something big had happened; Kylo looks right at him, in fact. And Awakens has Finn more than once wield a light saber. It’s all right there.
I don’t know if what they did means Finn is Jedi material or has a connection like Chirrut Imwe in Rogue One. And I don’t care. I just like the idea of the Force continuing to expand its connection with people. The film generally does a terrible job of building on Last Jedi’s great idea that we’re all connected to the Force. But this and the reveal that Jannah and the other former stormtroopers had a similar experience to Finn is something at least and I will take it.
Poe’s a Spice Runner and once Dated Lady Rocketeer!—No I’m kidding, who cares. Keri Russell was great, like when Juliet showed up and at first we were like, Are we doing this, and then by the end we were like Do You Really Have to Go; but you know what no one was clamoring for? Poe backstory.
He ended the last movie having screwed up everything for everyone. He’s responsible for the deaths of almost the entire Resistance. How is that not followed up on?
Rey’s Lightsaber – The color’s cool. Cooler still: my nephew pointed out that Rey’s saber looks like the bottom hosts another blade. Haven’t seen that confirmed but it makes sense, as her weapon of choice has always been a staff.
D-O: I don’t know what it is, but I really took to the new little droid. As soon as he backed away from Rey saying “No, thank you”, and she said he must have been mistreated by his last owner, I was just all in. I don’t know why, but that really got to me.
Top Five Weirdest Moments In The Rise of Skywalker:
Everyone’s Relationship with Everyone – I don’t know what was in the water on whatever planet they were hiding on, but is it me or did every character in Rise want to be having some personal time with every other character? Poe and Finn. But also Finn and Rey. And maybe Poe and Rey? Definitely Poe and Lady Rocketeer. And I don’t know, Finn and Jannah maybe? And apparently Rey and Ben. The chemistry was crazy to the point of being actually crazy. At least Rey picked someone, even if it didn’t feel right and people in the theater on opening night laughed uncomfortably and then Ben just vanished.
Then there’s the weird contrast of Finn and Rose having had so much chemistry in Jedi, and now he’s brushing her off harder than Kate with Jack back in the present after the beard. Totally unexplained and just so wrong. And no one else seems at all interested in her either.
Best tweet I saw on this:
Also on relationships, did anyone else wonder what exactly the story must be behind Palpatine’s long ago affair? Everything in me was a hundred varieties of no and yeesh.
I have something I have to tell you, Rey, but not in this movie. The “but who was on the outrigger boat tho?” of Rise, there’s clearly a story about why they never resolved this. Like they shot the scene and then they crashed on an island that is somehow moving through time and while they were there they accidentally erased that scene from out of existence and they were there until, like, the day before the film was released, so there was no time to fix it. Sad!
Having said that, John Boyega was fantastic, for me the emotional core of the film.
Everything to do with the Final Battle Above Exeter (which looks way different than I thought it would, boarding schools are scary you guys): So you’ve got a million new star destroyers, and any one of them can blow up a whole planet, in fact one of them already has begun doing so. Cool cool Cool.
Oh but for now that’s the only now that can leave the atmosphere? And even once people have boarded the surface of your ship and are riding horses across it (huh?), you still can’t I don’t know, rock the ship around a bit? Or just rise high enough that they all suffocate?
My niece said to me of that section, “You know all those horses died.” Which, OOF. And also, Um, Yeah. It was a moment I was very excited about it in theory – horses in space! – but then in practice it was just a sight gag.
Nothing about that final battle made sense, other than it needed to be there so that the Emperor could replay that moment in Return of the Jedi where he showed Luke his friends are dying. The only good thing about it was that Snap Wexley died.
(Fun fact: Pretty sure bit player Snap Wexley had more screen time and more lines in this film than Rose Tico. He also had a more impactful moment, as his death made Poe freeze up and almost lead everyone to their deaths (again).)
“Why don’t we go look for your parents?” I was relieved that the Jannah/Lando moment did not end in him saying Hey I think I’m Your Dad, because the two characters had never had a moment together, let alone storylines that earned that beat (especially Lando).
But then the Visual Dictionary apparently confirms they are father/daughter and Lando had this incredible backstory about having his daughter stolen and spending twenty years looking for her and all the other children and I can’t believe I’m saying this but maybe I want to see the 4 hour cut of Rise?
“Hey what’s your last name?” First of all, as anyone who has ever lived in New York knows, the only correct answer to someone who keeps asking about your name is words that I am not going to print here but they sound like swearing.
Second, where did that lady even come from? They’re in the desert. What, she just happening to stop by the old ranch where that couple got murdered and their nephew disappeared thirty years ago? What?
Lastly:
My Top Five Call Backs:
Han and Ben: I needed that moment so much. It could have been anything and I would have been happy, but to actually repeat so much of their dialogue from Force Awakens, and weave in Han’s signature “I Know”? *chef’s kiss*
Luke and Rey: This scene didn’t work as well for me, both because they didn’t let Luke have the quirky modern dialogue that was his signature in Jedi, and also Just how much can force ghosts do? He raised a whole X-Wing for God’s sake.
I have missed this X-Wing so much. It is my spirit animal.
But I loved the initial call back to Last Jedi, with Rey now throwing the saber away and this time it’s Luke who catches it. And his words about fear marry so well with Leia at the beginning.
Rey, Poe and Finn on the Star Destroyer: So the “Rescue Chewie” sequence is A New Hope’s “We have to Rescue the Princess” in miniature, right down to Jedi-Rey going a different direction to get something else, then having to face her Dark Side opponent while stormtroopers watch. Then the story jump cuts to the end of Empire, with Ben telling Rey to join him and she’s got all this very unsettling new information about her past and she’s looking out over the edge of the hanger bay, knowing what she has to do. And then she’s rescued by the Falcon.
It does feel like a pretty similar set of beats to the Starkiller Base in Awakens, though – rescue Rey, Han faces Kylo; also Luke’s distraction of Kylo at the end of Jedi is a play on Ben distracting Vader. You gotta love the classics, I guess?
Everything to Do with Palpatine’s Death – My nephew wondered why Rey had two light sabers but then didn’t cut off Palpatine’s head. (My nephew is a Sith, btw.)
I hadn’t realized it before he said that, but that moment is almost certainly a play on Revenge of the Sith. Anakin has the two sabers, he shouldn’t behead Dooku but then he does. Rey chooses the better path.
Likewise, the fact that Palpatine’s lightning bolts are themselves the cause of his destruction comes right from him fighting Mace Windu in Sith.
Also in this section, Rey and Ben echo Luke and Vader in Return of the Jedi, but where Vader saves Luke by killing the Emperor, in Rise Ben’s sacrifice is wholly about giving life.
I loved the few moments we got of the real Ben. You could see Driver really getting into it, too; there was a playfulness there that I wish we could have had more of.
Also I wish that his only word in the last ten or twenty minutes had not been “Ow.” So weird.
Awakens vs. Rise Storylines: So the general plot of Force Awakens is the Resistance struggling to get the information that will lead them to the Last Jedi. And the general plot of Rise of Skywalker? The Resistance struggling to get the information that will lead them to the last Sith. Some might say that’s a problem, but I like the bookending.
I could say more — True or False, the Knights of Ren are more hyped and then disappointing than the Heart of the Island; Where Can I find Jorge Garcia these days?; Babu Frik! — but that’s probably enough. Star Wars I love you, but it’s time to rest.
My Final Word for now:
And also, to quote someone else:
That’s the last episode of the year. I’m off until the 19th, but then I’ll be back for Season 5. Whee!
Happy New Year! Thanks for reading!