Unlike Ben Solo, Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker has not lost its way

Master of the mystery box, J.J. Abrams, is deep in make-nice mode with every Star Wars fanboy, fangirl and fanthey in the world, presumably at the mercy of the Disney powers-that-be knowing this is the make-or-break moment for the franchise on which they spent a national economy.

After a screening at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences on Friday, (Vanity Fair’s Anthony Breznican) asked Abrams what he would say to those who are unhappy. Are they not getting something? Is there a problem in the fandom? “No, I would say that they’re right,” he answered quickly. “The people who love it more than anything are also right.”

In other words, just see my movie and love it because The Force and everything. The thing is, Abrams has nothing to apologize for. The Rise of Skywalker is pure Star Wars, not only bringing to clarity so much of The Force Awakens AND The Last Jedi, but also aligning perfectly with the original troika of A New Hope, The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi.

So, what’s with all the backlash and dismissive hate cast Skywalker’s way? Quite simply, people seem to have lost track of what Star Wars was, is and will continue to be: an outlandish, pulpy, sci-fi romp filled with humor and sadness, good and evil, romance and despair. In other words…melodrama.

Majestical, epic melodrama at that.

I’ve seen Skywalker twice now, and my enjoyment only increased on my second viewing – something I can only say holds true for Episodes IV, V, VI and VII (you do the math). For the record, I really like The Last Jedi – a lot – but there are two major flaws with it:

1. There are wholesale scenes I would excise, the most prominent being the entire setting of Las Vegas in the Stars, a.k.a. Canto Bight. Be honest, that section plays more early-Harry Potter than Star Wars;
2. The movie does very little to drive the overall Star Wars story along, plumbing deep into folklore and character, but leaving our heroes and villains not too far afield from where they started, meaning whatever Episode IX was going to be, it had a ton of heavy lifting to do.

So, what did that mean for the SW creative team? First, they had to acknowledge that Colin Trevorrow, the original scribe/director hired to close things out was a hack (aside from his first, very small, very quirky flick Safety Not Guaranteed) and politely jettison him in the first available escape pod. That left three manageable routes: return to TLJ master Rian Johnson, return to TFA master Abrams or see how Ron Howard finesses the Han Solo thingy to the finish line (oops). Back with J.J. it is!

With that Hollywood political dynamic taken care of, Abrams and his co-screenwriter Chris Terrio could set out to bring a close to the grand arc of the Skywalker clan and their merry band of friends and frenemies. But, again, Johnson left LITERALLY EVERYTHING on the table to be resolved, including a lot of fan backlash of his own. Rey’s parents? Finn’s childhood origins? Poe’s sexuality? Kylo’s/Ben’s anger management? 3PO’s relevance? Snoke? Hux? The little kid with the broom?

Clearly, there needed to be a single Big Bad once again, and Palpatine fit the bill. Evil – check.

One of the biggest complaints about TLJ was how our three heroes spent nearly every waking moment apart (which is not too dissimilar from Empire when you think about it), so why not leverage the incredible charisma of the three leads and send them on a scavenger hunt across the galaxy with a super-crazy time limit (16 hours? Why??? Because. OK.). Good – check.

What Abrams and team ultimately assemble is a raucous adventure on par with Return of the Jedi, ultimately the most watchable Star War despite the Ewoks. Skywalker has amazing moments of gasps (literally, gasps were exclaimed by audiences both times I saw it), laughs (Ben Solo’s “Ow” is classic), cheers (Rey’s jump to the Millennium Falcon is the Death Star rope swing of our age) and jeers (Ian McDiarmid’s Palpatine is one of cinema’s all-time greatest villains, PERIOD).

Does this plot-heavy adventure move at a breakneck pace? You betcha! Does it help to have Star Wars coursing through your veins so you don’t miss a beat? Yeah, probably. Is poor Rose marginalized to a bit player with wooden lines? Without a doubt…. Do any of these things take Skywalker away from its campy roots of Episode IV, V and VI? Hell no.

One of the biggest gripes about this final chapter is management of Rey’s lineage and the departure from Rian Johnson’s TLJ narrative that anyone can be a Jedi. Skywalker deals with this without erasing Johnson’s story details, making them stronger, if anything. But reflect back on the story of Luke and his big paternal reveal in Empire. That movie starts with brother and sister kissing and ends with him wrestling with the notion that his long-lost father wants him dead. All the meanwhile, the most intuitive beings of the galaxy, Vader and Palpatine, can’t seem to locate him despite the fact he’s bumping around a planet with Imperial troops for years with the last name of SKYWALKER! Despite that gaping plot hole, we Star Wars fans forgave everything and often look to Empire as one of the greatest sequels of all time.

So, why is Skywalker different? Why have more critics panned it than they did Attack of the Clones, Revenge of the Sith or the Solo thingy? Why is it, seemingly, so…bad?

Quite frankly, it’s not.

Is it great cinema? Yeah. Why not? It more than holds true to the great melodramatic tradition set forth in the original trilogy, creating fantastic worlds and fun characters (I want an entire movie with Naomi Ackie and her Force-sensitive fellow stormtrooper ex-pats doing some damage!). Go see it with the same expectations and enthusiasm with which you saw Return of the Jedi and you are sure to exit happy.

And, as J.J. said, “We knew starting this that any decision we made — a design decision, a musical decision, a narrative decision — would please someone and infuriate someone else.”

The thing is, everybody isn’t right. Don’t cede the high ground J.J.!