'The Rise of Skywalker' Was Fine, But Here’s How I’d Do It

The Rise of Skywalker was a fine movie. It may not have been the best Star Wars movie, and in spite of its flaws, it was not the worst. I think that if you changed a few beats, and some major plot points, the movie would have been better and resonated better with casual viewers as well as Star Wars fans and loyalists.

Most movies aim for a specific target audience. Star Wars is stuck in between. George Lucas developed it to target kids, and those kids have now become adults, and those now adults are still huge fans of the franchise. It’s hard to craft a movie that still targets kids, but satisfies adults who hold an idyllic memory/opinion of Star Wars from their childhood. Lucas tried adding poop and fart jokes from Jar Jar to reach out to children amid discussions of galactic trade disputes in The Phantom Menace. And Disney would dare not allow Star Wars to be turned into a more adult/Game of Thrones style R-rated production. Nor would the die-hard fans want that. We are left with a near impossible goal for The Rise of Skywalker: to wrap up a beloved 9-film arc spanning decades and generations that makes everyone happy. Of course, the film would make money with all the budget, marketing, and history behind it. But would it satiate the Star Wars fan?

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First, the writing needs to be more cohesive. For all the faults in the prequel trilogy, the storyline makes sense and feels planned out. The micro may have issues, but the macro is largely fine. By originally having three different filmmakers take three different approaches to the sequel films with minimal interaction, the storylines did not come together. This is most visible in The Rise of Skywalker. Abrams and Terrio's script in The Rise of Skywalker seemed at times to be retconning some of The Last Jedi concepts, such as by dismissing the Holdo Maneuver, minimizing Rose, and Luke's attitude toward his lightsaber. Then again, it may have even been more helpful or consistent to have a third director, as Colin Trevorrow was initially planned. Many fans enjoyed his leaked Episode IX - Duel of the Fates script. But instead, JJ Abrams was brought back in after the success of The Force Awakens and criticism of Rian Johnson’s The Last Jedi. And indeed, Abrams brought many of his ideas back from Episode VII and paid less attention to some of Johnson’s additions in Episode VIII.

Speaking of minimizing Rose, the final film seemed to hang some characters out to dry. Rose was minimized from being a main character to only being in the film for a couple of minute. Finn’s role was likewise reduced as the sequel trilogy went along. Star Wars is full of all sorts of beings from all over the universe. The Empire, and later the First Order, represents human/special elitism, not the Rebellion/Resistance where our beloved characters are from. The Rise of Skywalker script seemed to react to the backlash of “too much progressivism” from The Last Jedi, and instead bent all the storylines back to the mainstream to try and decrease criticism. This seemed more like an attempt to respond to a poorly developed studio survey intent on raising box office revenue, at the expense of story and character. While The Rise of Skywalker, did move very fast and rely too much on exposition to move even faster, minimizing key characters to whom we have an attachment from the prior sequel trilogy movies was not the answer.

One of the most common criticisms is Rey being a Palpatine and bringing Emperor Palpatine back as the main villain. The vast Star Wars universe seems so small when only a few interconnected people can make a difference in the universe. What people didn’t like about The Last Jedi is that it took traditional Star Wars arcs and broke them. Rey’s parents were filthy junk traders and sold her for drinking money in The Last Jedi. This is a big arc change, but having Rey be independently powerful would give so much more credence to her story. It’s frustrating that Star Wars has been so insular for so long that fans were guessing at which sequel trilogy character would be related to whom. Is Rey a Kenobi? Is Finn a Calrissian? The Rise of Skywalker tops this off by including so much fan service, highlighted most by connecting Rey and Palpatine. Rey being connected to no one does not connect to the prior trilogies, and potentially enhance revenue as much as being connected to someone fans are familiar with. In my mind, opening the door to Rey’s family not being a known commodity opens the door more to anyone changing the universe in Star Wars. It also pivots the main villain away from Kylo Ren, when it was set up so well for him to take the throne as the main villain, after killing Han Solo and Snoke. As stated earlier, the movie moves too fast anyway, and not needing to explain the Palpatine story, which is largely exposition anyway, would make the film run much more smoothly.

And to tie in with Rey’s lineage, leaning into the balance of the Force was a missed opportunity for me in The Rise of Skywalker. Anakin is the Chosen One from prophecy, but Rey’s similar upbringing provided an opportunity to peak behind the curtain and remove, or at least adjust, the overly simplified, and much disliked, midi-chlorians from Star Wars. Not everything in fantasy or magic needs a full explanation. While it is a bit vague, we still know that the Force seems like it can be passed to someone through genetics (a Force-sensitive parent), or even just randomly. It would have been more powerful, and given more ethereal power to the Force, to have Anakin’s immaculate conception/birth be as a result of the balance of the Force. When there is too much power on the light side, the Force would make the dark side stronger by populating a child in a location where it would likely balance the Force; such as a slave on Tatooine, outside the reach of the light side in power, the Jedi. Likewise, Rey could also have been conceived by the Force and kept hidden on a backwater planet of Jakku, to balance the Force while the dark side was in power. Tying the Force more directly to human genetics, as The Rise of Skywalker does for Rey, makes the force less spiritual. I believe they had a great opportunity here to expand upon the Force’s mythology.

The Rise of Skywalker had its flaws, but was a very enjoyable film. After seeing so many fan critiques and disillusionment with the ending of the Skywalker saga, I wanted to share a few of my ideas on some possible changes that I found interesting, that in my opinion would have helped the film. What changes would you have made? And what do you hope to see in the upcoming Star Wars movies and television shows? I hope for the best for my favorite film franchise and cinematic universe.

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Written By Dave Sacca

Source(s): Forbes, The Edge, Vox

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