REVIEW #36 Star Wars New Trilogy (2015-2019)

The latest Star Wars trilogy consists of Star Wars: The Force Awakens (2015), Star Wars: The Last Jedi (2017) and Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker (2019). This set of films follow the latest Jedi prospect Rey as she stumbles upon the resistance, soon to realise she has strong ties to the force and the Sith.


CAST & THE ACTING (8.5/10)

I actually think the casting was good and the acting very convincing. The cast was full of charisma and there were certainly less cringeworthy moments in this trilogy compared to the previous two. Daisy Ridley plays Rey and delivers a strong performance, portraying a lost girl searching for a family and a purpose. Adam Driver plays they main villain Kylo Ren and also does well, sharing similarities with Rey in the sense that he seems lost, clinging on to the dark side for purpose. Other cast members include John Boyega as Finn, Oscar Issac as Poe and Carrie Fisher, Mark Hamill and Harrison Ford all reprise their roles as Leia, Luke and Han Solo. As much hate as this trilogy receives I do think the acting and the casting was pretty good, adding some great characters to the Star Wars universe.


PLOT & THE STORYLINE (6.5/10)

These films are entertaining, there is no doubt about that but I have to say it is some of the laziest writing I have ever seen. Rey is almost a copy of Luke, a young adult unaware of their ties to the force, from a baron land similar to Tatooine. In addition to this they bring back an even bigger version of the Death Star in The Last Jedi, this time built into a planet... come on they have used that plot two times already, there is absolutely no need to use it again. There is so many other avenues they could have gone down to create a better storyline, lazy, lazy writing. Finally they bring back Emperor Palpatine, somehow he’s survived all these years which is absolutely bizzare and causes more questions and plot holes throughout the whole franchise. For example Palpatine can survive all of that, Anakin can survive getting his limbs chopped off and burned alive but Padmé dies in childbirth and nothing can be done about it? The more I watch these films the more questions I have regarding their lazy writing and blatant plot holes! However I do like the Kylo Ren aspect, Leia and Han’s son turning to the dark side, but raising another version of the evil Empire... I think they could have done something better with him. Personally I would have like to have seen him leave Luke’s teaching with the other apprentices and raise a group of Sith Lords, that would be more exciting right? So I have to give a poor score here.


CINEMATOGRAPHY & SPECIAL EFFECTS (9/10)

I think you are almost guaranteed a 9 out of ten when it comes to modern Star Wars films. With the big Disney budget you would expect nothing less, the special effects are great! The fight scenes throughout the 3 films are great and we do see some fantastic light saber duels which were emphasised by some great camera work. So I think a big score here is justified and hard to argue with.


OVERALL (8/10)

These films are entertaining to watch but the storyline has to be some of the laziest writing I have ever seen. With a world as big as the Star Wars franchise they really did shoot themselves in a foot with a very unimaginative plot for the three films. However they did introduce some good characters like Kylo Ren, Rey and Fin and the acting was probably the best to watch out of all three trilogies. The special effects are great as you would expect from a modern day Star Wars film made by Disney so that also helps make up for a very poor storyline. So I think an 8 is fair but it could have been an outstanding set of films if Disney didn’t reuse plots, copy characters and were just more imaginative in their writing.


Thanks for reading 

Callan

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