Rise of Skywalker Showed Loving Star Wars Has Its Limits

© Lucasfilm

 Five years later, the conclusion to the Skywalker Saga has still left a mark on Star Wars and the world's relationship to it.

The past decade of Star Wars has been… a lot: interesting, thrilling, exhausting, disappointing. You pick a descriptor, and it could probably apply at any point after The Force Awakens revitalized the franchise, the two spinoff movies did what they could, and The Last Jedi tried to take new swings, gizmodo.com. What one word describes The Rise of Skywalker in the cleanest, most charitable way? How about “compromised”?

Rise of Skywalker released in theaters on December 20, 2019, and back then, all eyes were on it. This was a movie in an unenviable position: beyond the mission of wrapping the Disney-branded “Skywalker Saga,” it had to contend with handling Carrie Fisher’s passing in between movies, plus discussions of how returning director J.J. Abrams and co-writer Chris Terrio would build on the path set by Awakens and Last. And by hitting during Christmas season, it made itself the final “last” in a year that featured the equally momentous Avengers: Endgame and the Game of Thrones finale.

So yeah, there was a lot of pressure on Rise to deliver the goods and end in a way that satisfied everyone. And after all the buildup, it… did not do really do that. Like, at all. No doubt people like the film or find it enjoyable, but there’s no denying that it feels like something happened during production, and the end result is a film that leaves a weird taste in your mouth. After leaving the theater and hopping online, there was overwhelmingly a collective feeling of “what the hell was that?” that made it even more incendiary to talk about than Last Jedi. That part may have been unavoidable, but the rest can be owed strictly to the movie as is, from its weird moments of fan service to pulled punches and open knowledge that it was born after original director Colin Trevorrow left the project. Whatever high points the film is said to have, they exist in a movie that apparently came in so hot, the entire catalyst for its events had to be put in Fortnite pre-release, but not the movie itself.

If Last Jedi’s shadow has loomed over Star Wars for seven years and counting, Rise of Skywalker is a monster that pulled the entire franchise into its mouth and has yet to either digest it or just give up and spit it out. While it made money, it didn’t take long to suspect Disney may have been embarrassed by the reactions to it. (Case in point: the film’s comic adaptation is finally coming out in February after it was announced back in 2020.) Any goodwill initially earned with Force Awakens basically eroded in real time once Rise revealed that Palpatine returned somehow, or later on when Chewbacca gets “killed.” And if that didn’t do it, the “Rey is Palpatine’s granddaughter” reveal might’ve been the first kiss of death for the film, and the final one for Skywalker Saga. The film ultimately posits that Rey being a Palpatine doesn’t matter since she’s chosen her own name and family. But in adopting the Skywalker surname, she just trades one legacy name for another in what could hilariously read as a story of a woman pulling off the most elaborate identity theft scheme in the universe.

Is Disney bad at this, owning Star Wars? That question’s been hovering around for years, and sparked up once again in the wake of The Acolyte’s cancelation. The results are inconclusive: on one hand, Andor is some really good-ass television, and other media like the High Republic and various video games have been pretty consistently good. At the same time, Disney just can’t seem to get any kind of firm handle on the movie and TV front: there hasn’t been a new theatrical movie since Rise came out, and every new announcement for one (or three) films that are tooooootally happening feels like an ongoing joke. Likewise, it’s a crap shoot as to how a show’s going to turn out, what cameos it’ll inevitably feature, and what kind of future it’ll have. Audiences seem to like the currently airing Star Wars: Skeleton Crew, but the jury’s still out on if it’ll go as far as the creators hope, or if its wings will be cut out from under it and not get to fulfill its promise, a problem that goes well beyond this franchise.

There is some light at the end of the tunnel; namely Dave Filoni’s Mandalorian & Grogu movie in 2026 and a second season of Ahsoka, plus the second (and sadly final) season of Andor in April. Will audiences be willing to stick their neck out again and see where this is all going? It’s easy to say “yes” and point to Marvel, which many have felt has had its strongest year since Avengers: Endgame. But the MCU has yet to have a movie that’s openly broken the enterprise quite like Rise of Skywalker did, and it’s about to pull some interesting new tricks out of its sleeve. If Star Wars is going to be back at that same level… well, it’ll take some work, and more importantly, consistency and conviction.