Disney and Lucasfilm disastrously fumbled the ball with the Star Wars sequel trilogy.
The Force Awakens exploded into theaters in 2015 and instantly become a colossal hit, building an enormous amount of hype about what was coming in the two sequels. Rian Johnson followed it up with The Last Jedi, which famously infuriated large swathes of the fanbase. The House of Mouse took fright and drastically course corrected with The Rise of Skywalker, resulting in objectively the worst Star Wars movie to date.
It’s a depressing saga that nonetheless teaches some valuable lessons. If you know you’re making a trilogy, plan out the entire story ahead of time and stick to what you decided. Don’t pay too much attention to angry comments on the internet. And above all try and have a single creative vision behind the project. Say what you like about the prequel trilogy, but at least it has George Lucas’ fingerprints on every frame.
Three years on from The Rise of Skywalker the dust has settled on the sequel trilogy and Star Wars fans are debating what, if anything, positive can be salvaged from this mess. The best comments point out that the films at least succeeded in bringing a generation of young fans to the franchise, saying ” seeing their love for Star Wars through the sequels makes me happy.” Another says:
“There was a little girl in my class who wore “Rey” hair nearly every day. Rey is her idol. I just can’t bring myself to hate on that despite how disappointing the movies were to me.”
Others identify The Rise of Skywalker as the real problem, arguing that it retroactively makes The Force Awakens and The Last Jedi worse. That’s certainly true for us, as it’s painful watching interesting themes, plot threads and characters you know will be abandoned come the big finale.
But the most common reaction is advice to not waste precious time getting upset at their existence. Maybe mentally write them off as the most expensive fan fiction of all time, or just pretend they didn’t happen. After all, Star Wars is now so expansive that the movies are just one piece of the puzzle.
Let’s just thank the Force for Jon Favreau and Dave Filoni over at Disney Plus.