Thread by @rosamundhodge

So. Did I enjoy watching #TheRiseOfSkywalker? Well, yes. Almost every scene is funny or exciting or genuinely moving.

Do I absolutely hate the story they assembled those scenes to tell? OH HECK YEAH.

This is a movie that so desperately wants to please its audience, it ends up being viciously cruel to its characters, denying them either happy endings or the catharsis of satisfying character arcs.

Remember how TFA established that Rey craves belonging and greenery, and then TROS leaves her on a desert planet, her soulmate dead, with a family of ghosts?

REMEMBER HOW THEY DIDN'T LET REY MOURN THE MAN WHO IS LITERALLY THE OTHER HALF OF HER SOUL?

Remember how TROS made it canon that the son of Han and Leia has been psychically preyed upon by Palpatine for his whole life, and then he dies 10 seconds after we first see him smile?

Remember when Rey spent two movies dealing with her abandonment by her parents, and then suddenly they replaced that with a bland, conflict-free rehash of Ben's "inherited darkness" issues?

Remember when they wanted to explore Dark Rey, so they retconned her parents to keep her from feeling any anger at them, didn't let Chewie stay dead when she "killed" him, and her big temptation was Sheev saying "do this or I kill your friends"?

Remember when "your parents sold you to Unkar Plutt" was reframed as some big heroic act for which Rey should be GRATEFUL? As if it doesn't matter how thoroughly their plan to "protect" her actually screwed her over?

Remember how at the end of TLJ Luke promised Ben to "see you around, kid" and the story of his last stand inspired the galaxy, and then in TROS he's just Rey's private life-coach?

Remember how Vader died at peace because he had saved his son? And how Han, Luke, and Leia all died with "peace and purpose" largely to save their son/nephew? WHO DIED AN HOUR LATER??

Remember how, when he was still on the Dark Side, Ben said that he could never go home? And then the movie was like, "CORRECT, prodigal sons are never allowed to go home, the best they can hope for is to die heroically"?

Remember how Finn had a two-movie arc of going from "a man who runs" to proud-of-it "rebel scum," and then in TROS he basically shouts "Rey!" a lot and asks Jannah to lend them space horses?

Remember how they show us that all Stormtroopers could throw down their weapons, not just Finn, and then they completely ignore that to go back to blowing them all up?

REMEMBER HOW FINN WANTS TO TELL REY ONE THING BEFORE HE DIES AND THEN NEVER GETS TO?

Remember how Poe....actually does get to be the leader Leia believed he could become, kudos to the movie for that.

But "Poe was a spice runner" is just a rehash of TLJ's "our hero with the shiny smile has flaws," except TLJ gave him flaws that flowed organically from his strengths & that he got to grow beyond, while in TROS the drugs are just...there, retconning his backstory for no payoff.

REMEMBER WHEN THEY COMPLETELY SCREWED OVER ROSE TICO IN A TRANSPARENT ATTEMPT TO PACIFY THE FANS WHO BULLIED KELLY MARIE TRAN OFF SOCIAL MEDIA??

Remember when they brought back master manipulator Palpatine, and his ploy was just "help me or I kill your friends? As if Rey isn't his granddaughter who has deep abandonment issues, and he doesn't have experience passing himself off as a kindly old man?

One of my favorite things about TLJ was that it made me love stuff that I didn't think I wanted. What galls me the most about TROS is that, not only does it make a lot of choices I hate, it makes them *badly.*

#TheRiseOfSkywalker is a movie so obsessed with making all the references and trying to appease all the fans, it never takes the time to actually sell you on any its plot choices. It can't, because it won't commit to any of them.

This is a movie that makes Ben into Rey's soulmate but won't let them be together but also won't let her mourn him, & hints at Finn loving Rey but won't let him confess, & redeems Ben but immediately kills him, & tries to make Rey a nobody & a Palpatine & a Skywalker all at once.

And then it leaves Rey alone on a dead planet and thinks this is a happy ending because OOH NOSTALGIA. I'm just. never going to be over that.

(also, lmao at her burying the Skywalker lightsabers on a planet every single one of them hated.)

Look, I love Star Wars. One of my favorite things to do is love Star Wars. And even within this movie, there's a whole lot to love. It's a mess, but it's the kind of mess that inspires a lot of excellent fanfic, and I'm super looking forward to what the fandom does with it.

But it could have been a masterpiece. It could have at least been a solid piece of storytelling. IT WOULD NOT HAVE BEEN THAT HARD. And I'm really disappointed that it's not.

Since this thread is getting traction: please check out this gofundme, where Adam Driver/Ben Solo fans are raising money for Adam’s charity. gofundme.com/f/bensoloslega…