Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker releases this month, with just a few weeks until we at last get to witness the conclusion of the Skywalker saga and find out whether it ends the story with aplomb. We’re still some time away from getting reviews, then, but an early reaction to the movie gives us a feel for what Lucasfilm has got in store for us. And it’s pretty encouraging.
We Got This Covered has spoken to someone who attended two separate test screenings of TROS and they’ve shared their verdicts on both of them with us. The first one, which apparently saw the film clock in at 2 hours and 45 minutes, was deemed overlong and messy with the storyline lacking focus. This doesn’t sound too good, but they note that the second screening was much more successful.
Apparently, the runtime was leaner, the pacing was better and the visuals and action scenes were great, even if the VFX had yet to be completed. Overall, they decreed that the studio had managed to fix the problems that the earlier cut suffered from, but also mentioned that some of the twists didn’t sit well with them.
As we’ve previously reported, this same individual personally felt that Rise ranked as the third best Star Wars movie behind The Empire Strikes Back and A New Hope. Again, this is just one person’s opinion, and we all know how SW fans differ greatly in their views. Still, this is exciting to hear and indicates that most folks will respond positively to Episode IX when it finally arrives.
At least, we hope that’s the case, as there’s a lot of pressure on TROS to get it right. Director J.J. Abrams has to both up his game from his previous effort, The Force Awakens, as well as serve up something less controversial than Rian Johnson’s The Last Jedi. Yet, at the same time, he can’t make something as purely nostalgic as TFA. That’s an incredibly difficult tightrope to walk, so if he manages to deliver a final product that can be considered one of the franchise’s finest entries, that’d be mighty impressive.
I guess we’ll find out when Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker blasts into theaters on December 20th.