POLL: The Sequel Trilogy is complete--what do you think?

Just for Protocol: I really liked Rey, I love Daisey Ridley's Portrayal, I think she was one of the biggest Positives for me In the new Trilogy. Fresh, energetic, and sympathic.
But here comes my Opinion:
To me, this Trilogy was more like "Rey Wars".

It felt like this is Rey's universe and we are all just a small part of that. All the characters, plot points and actions felt centered around that. I never, ever got that feeling when I watched Luke or Anakin. I think you can have a franchise centered around a single character like that, similar to the Hunger Games or some super hero film like Spiderman. It just didn't feel in place with Star Wars. The universe always felt larger than the characters in Star Wars in the past. In the past I always felt I really was in a galaxy separate from this, watching from afar in amazement.

I think what these new films have done most importantly is lessened my enjoyment of the original films.
If I accept the sequel trilogy then I don't think I can really enjoy the original six films as I had before. Otherwise I'd have to just pretend like the sequel films don't really exist and nothing that happened to the original characters, lore, canon, ways of the Force, etc were ever affected. Neither choice is a good one and that makes me sad.

 

Complete is such a strong word when I think of Star Wars, I definitely don’t think that all films are done. I think that this SAGA may be done, but maybe there will be another saga which will take place before or after this one.

 

God awful i am sorry but i was extremely disappointed by them and there were so many missed opportunities.

 

I just finished watching the entire ST this weekend to cap off my complete Star Wars marathon with all of the movies and canonical shows. And despite my reservations, gripes, and disappointments with the trilogy, I really enjoyed them and feel satisfied with how they ended the saga as we know it.

I look forward to when the ST will be less divisive and more widely accepted just as the prequels were.

 

This is a personal opinion, but I dislike the idea of grouping some of these films into a trilogy, and then determining whether the "trilogy is good or bad" when it could just be that there was an supremely crafted excellent film, to increase a trilogy's quality, or an abysmal film, which could lower the trilogy as a whole. Why does everyone want a three-part trilogy? The perfect standard three? I'd rather take A New Hope or The Empire Strikes Back on pretty much their own merits and call it a day.

I can't say if everything out of Final Fantasy VII is perfect, but there are some parts better than classic literature in the game. This is coming from an English major.

I will be honest, the films are good, but Star Wars hasn't been substantial in ages. Ages and ages, until the rocks crumble from the mountains. Like I can't watch the films without some callback to another film or a certain line being repeated by another character or ANOTHER theme being repeated, or a rebel force trying to go against the big empire.

Or, the continual emphasis on the big bad- the Emperor throughout the films. Sure, he has some nuance, but I think he's overrated and even a poor representation of the dark side and even less of a character because he is almost the dark side personified, rather than a person corrupted by it (Vader).

I mean, I can't even understand the rage for TLJ, when it went almost straight back to TESB and tried succeeding it. The tone-deafness ticked people off? Being tone-deaf isn't Star Wars? Have you not watched ROTJ, when Luke and Han were wisecracking before Jabba the Hutt made their death sentence? Or when the escape scene from the Sarlacc pit was executed with heroic music from Williams only to be later deflated with the scene of Luke putting a black glove over his hand from being shot in the scene, signifying a shift towards the dark side, from the fight? Or the back and forth emotions of Luke after Vader dies- sadness- to pride and stoicism during the pyre scene- to slight sadness during the party- to warmth and happiness after seeing his father back?

Even when TLJ is being tone-deaf or close to tone-deaf, there' still an intelligent point it- Luke being fed up with the Jedi, trying to teach Rey something. I can't say if I get that from ROTJ, for the most part.

 

I don't like TLJ for some of the reasons that follow, and two stupid personal things, the Holdo Manuever, and Rose trying to sacrifice herself to save Finn who is trying to sacrifice himself to save everyone.

First of all, the Force Awakens boxed any subsequent movie into a horrible position before said sequel was even written.

One of the main things is the obvious villain problem with the First Order. It has never seemed like a fully credible villainous faction, because, aside from blowing up a government we as an audience knew nothing about and therefore had no emotional investment in, and they have never really accomplished anything. We are TOLD they are a threat, but they never seem able to enact that threat convincingly.

We don't know anything about the heroes or the villains of this trilogy from what is presented in Force Awakens. One movie later, we’re still asking a bunch of questions: What the hell is the First Order? When did THEY show up? What are they after? Because it looks like they just enjoy being mustache twirly cartoon supervillains who enjoy blowing up planets and oppressing people just for the sake of being evil. Why isn't anyone fighting them?

The First Order, Kylo Ren, Snoke, and Hux are hollow phantoms just reenacting past events with no matter or weight behind them solely because fans said they wanted Star Wars to return to being like the original trilogy, and J.J Abrams, hungry for a popularity he hasn't had since his first Star Trek reboot film, overcompensated on what he delivered.

These sins passed to Last Jedi, which therefore wisely shifts focus from factional rivalry between two lingering ghosts (not-Rebel Alliance vs not-Empire) to something far more intimate and personal: Rey and Kylo Ren are confronted with their lack of family bonds. Poe learns the value of long plays and compartmentalization, seeing the big picture, and putting aside his thirst for heroic glory. Finn overcomes his cowardly tendencies and learns from Rose that he should do good because it is good instead of chasing self-destructive catharsis. And Luke? Luke comes to terms with the true role of the Jedi in the Galaxy and moves past his depression from prior failures and chooses to be, in his final moments, a symbol of hope and goodness opposing evil. In this way, Last Jedi, while flawed, is a FAR better film that Force Awakens.

Unfortunately for Last Jedi and Episode IX, there is no fixing the damage done to the trilogy by Force Awakens. Last Jedi could only swerve to avoid the pot holes in the road, but it could never repair them. Neither can Episode IX. Both films will forever be tainted by the laziness endemic to the set up of the new trilogy, in that there was no set up.

Just as Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith were both marked improvements over each of their predecessors, there was only so much each could do, and the injury done by Phantom Menace tainted the whole trilogy.

This is ultimately why a loud group of fans don't like Last Jedi: the problems introduced by Force Awakens (no set up for the plot, horrible incompetent villains, contextless heroes who frequently seem to be just as inept, both factions violently bumbling into each other with turn-based results, poor continuity of story, among other things) continued undiminished into Last Jedi, which can only say “please don't pay attention to those issues. We have these nice little personal stories for you!”, but fans didn’t want personal stories that forced our heroes to grow as people. They wanted those other preexisting issues to be addressed and fixed, or at least made to make sense. Last Jedi avoids talking about Force Awakens so much that if the two films didn't share 90% of their primary casts, few would have recognized that Last Jedi was a sequel.

They are incredibly different films, and while I think that Last Jedi is a much stronger film, it suffers because it's a sequel that didn't try to fix the problems handed to it by it's predecessor (not that that it ever could have, but a lot of folks were hoping it would at least try). In fact, it did everything it could to avoid looking at what came before.

Finally, in making these deep character stories, plot was thrown out of the window. While in the last 3rd of the film was excellent, it was too little too late. Rey and Luke were fine, but everybody else was plagued with stupidity and extreme coincidences. I know that these problems were prevalent in other Star War films, but along with TFA setting this movie up for failure, people were looking for reasons to hate this movie. And they found the humor, or weird story things like Holdo not telling Poe anything, or Rose sacrificing herself to save Finn who was sacrificing himself to save everyone, or even how Maz said that only one person in the galaxy could hack the Star Destroyer, but they get thrown into the cell where some random guy can do it, and he has an escape option and was just waiting.


Rian Johnson really did try to craft something meaningful, but for a whole lot of reasons, he could only please about half his audience. Hopefully the future is kinder to this movie than the present.

 

I totally agree. These films seem to get repetitive. However, the lines or themes from the PT that were originated in the OT seemed to fit well because it was like a callback to those previous films. With high standards when making the PT, adding those lines, like This is Where the Fun Begins, seemed to call back to some of the older fans if you know what I mean.

I think, if another film or trilogy were to be made, we would need a film like ROTS. We need a film where the “bad guys” lead. Not necessarily a downer type film, but a film that shocks fans. I would want a whole trilogy where these bad guys were dominant. I don’t mean to be evil, but if the main good guy character was killed in the last movie of a trilogy or an end of a side film, it would shock fans and maybe give us something different. Then we would follow up with something like hope where the bad guys are taken down. This part seems to be repetitive, but hear me out. After a whole trilogy or one movie where the bad guys seemed to be dominant, the good guys succeeding would just be wonderful and make for a good film or trilogy. Also, to be fair, I do like the trilogy format because the storyline is somewhat easier to follow and it fits better together, but then again your point is quite smart. One bad movie can actually bring down people’s perspective and opinion about the whole trilogy and a similar idea with a really good film. But, we still get shows and side films which really help move along the whole SW universe and give detail to known or unknown topic about the characters we know and love in the saga or additions to the SW universe.

 

I'm not sure this is the right place for this thought, but I don't quite know where it belongs and so it's going here:
My ongoing rewatch of the Skywalker Saga has helped me realize something that hadn't registered before and that would've completely changed my viewpoint on the Sequel Trilogy if it had occurred to me sooner: it isn't a single story told over nine installments, but 3 separate Serials that are self-contained within themselves while simultaneously forming part of a larger ongoing narrative, which is why you can have movies that "rehash" earlier parts of the Saga in either plot points or structure without it being a bad thing.

 

I voted for "Bad, I'll watch these movies, but they're not good"

 

I don't think these films are excellent but I'm changing my vote from, "Very good" to that because now that the sequel trilogy is in the rearview mirror, I've realized that beyond the quality of the films themselves, the when and the where matters.

I'm 24, this is my Star Wars. The OT wrapped up 13 years before I was born and the PT started rolling out just after I got out of diapers. I've always had to play catch up with Star Wars and that isn't as cool or exciting as it sounds. I didn't have to wait every 3 years for a movie or wait for a decade and a half between trilogies but before I watched the original trilogy I knew who Darth Vader was, I knew what his relationship with Luke was, I knew what Luke's relationship with Leia was, I never got to experience those massive, world shaking and changing reveals. I can vividly remember the hype for Revenge of the Sith, the movie that made me fall in love with Star Wars, but mainly it was because of the toys, video games and costumes that surrounded the movie, not necessarily the movie itself. Star Wars of course is for kids, but there are shades and intricacies, especially in the prequels and most, if not all of it was lost on 9 year old me. I always did like Star Wars, even as I got older and started showing it less, but for as big a phenomenon as it was, I always felt like I just missed it, I wasn't really able to experience it.

That's why I hold the ST in such high regard, the opportunity to finally be able to fully experience the phenomenon elevates it all for me. And I can imagine if you are my age or around it, and you don't like these movies then the experience did the exact opposite.

I'm genuinely sad that it's over, and I hope that my experience with Star Wars in the future, whatever it may be, is as fulfilling as these three films were.

 

Its... ok. just mehhhh but i love star wars no more MICKEY WARS PLEASE

 

I voted "Very good - not the best Star Wars, but great".

Apart from TLJ, which was a marvelous piece of cinema and an awesome emotional climax for the Skywalker Saga, I find the ST to be slighty inferior to the OT films, yet still a very strong outing and definitely high-quality Star Wars.

If one also considers, RO -- a charming & interesting mess of a movie, and Solo:ASWS -- just an amazing gem of a Star Wars film, then LFL's outing under Disney has been simply fantastic, making the last 5 years easily the best period to be a fan of this great franchise of ours. And then I haven't even touched upon The Mandalorian, and what that series promises for the future of SW TV!

Tier 1 SW: OT + TLJ + Solo:ASWA
Tier 2 SW: TFA + TRoS + RO
Tier 3 SW: PT​

Even at its lowest, SW is still far stronger a franchise than the vast amount of other franchises and story cycles out there, truly a modern mythology that will stay with humanity for a very many generations to come.

By the Whills, I love this quaint little-big thing that is Star Wars!

 

I voted just okay. Would have been good if not for TLJ. TROS is not a good film but I do find it fun.

 

Piggybacking off of my last post, I wish I'd come to my new realization about the Skywalker Saga films years ago because it would've totally changed my initial reaction to The Force Awakens and how I interacted with the SW franchise heading into the release of The Last Jedi because I wouldn't have been so focused on things like TFA being a rehash of ANH as if that were a bad thing.

 

This may be an unpopular opinion but I never disliked the sequel trilogy. Of course they weren't as good as the original trilogy but they weren't terrible.

 

Well I tried to watch the force awakens but in the first few minutes it was just the new characters walking around in the desert with their mouths open looking really confused so I turned it off.

 

I think a lot of fans were too focused on TFA being too similar to ANH as a negative thing. It didn't bother me, ANH is one of the greatest films of all time (joint top with TESB on my list) so I didn't see that as a negative.

TFA is by far my favourite film of the ST.

 

People don't know what the hell they want with Star Wars.

 

It was terrible mostly cause of Rey. The worst light saber duelest evar.

 

Continuing Star Wars' legacy has spawned creativity, but it's mostly repeated content or content that's mediocre and lacks information of what spawned it in the first place- a fraternity gathering of young, talented, mostly males in their 30s, combined with Lucas' mid-west/middle Californian upbringings in the middle class, combined with his education in filmmaking and philosophy, with some other talented filmmakers, artists, soundmakers, etc.