Is that this saga wasn't about Skywalker's at all - from beginning to end apparently this whole series was about Palpatine.
The way I see it all problems were seeds planted in TFA. JJ produces superficial fluff for the masses and it lacks substance almost always. If we consider for a second the Skywalkers still alive in TFA Leia was promoted to a general but JJ did nothing with that. Nothing. She could have been awesome as a commander while being a Jedi. Luke was the object of a McGuffin and didn't do anything so he was ultimately inconsequential. I think because the fans were ok with that shallowness Rian chose and was allowed to continue with them being fairly hollow. Luke wasn't what Luke really was in the original saga and Leia was still fairly meaningless as a character. Now, both of them could have either given the Skywalkers something valuable to do, or just kill them both off in one big battle for example. Imagine the impact if they were a power-duo that were properly used and built up in the first two movies, and then fighting a big battle and at the end of TLJ where they both die, leaving us with the next generation to fight for the good guys.... - OR they
could actually have not used the Skywalkers at all.
I think making it about Palpatine was super-clunky. The original was really about Vader, but Luke was the 'vehicle' for propelling it all. But Luke works and Rey doesn't, so Palpatine coming back just reeks of desperation...
So I was more upset about Palpatine returning than the films not being about the Skywalkers. I would have been fine with zero Skywalkers in the new trilogy to be honest.
In addition the story elements raced by so quickly there was no time to build any drama, any remorse or anticipation.
Well, it was shit story telling. The whole thing really felt like everyone involved read the criticism and understood something had to be done, but rather than think about it and create a great movie they just decided to tie up every loose end they found people complaining about. Like, why the hell were the Knights Of Ren even in that movie? Completely meaningless - except for the fact that people were asking questions about who they were and what their role was, so to put them in was to maybe please the fans that were wondering.
And that's how I felt about a very large amount of what's in this movie; it was a bunch of stuff shoved into the movie to just try to address all the questions and loose ends.
Going into TFA I had low expectations because JJ was directing and I know what he's about. He's about "mystery boxes" and he uses them to keep the audience wondering what's next. I don't think that's good story telling though. I watched Lost for a season and a half and realized that it would just keep on going with no guarantee of a satisfying resolution, and that's what I think JJ does: He throws stuff into a story because it sounds or looks good, and then he either answers questions with more questions or doesn't answer at all.
Take all the Palpatine stuff for example - doesn't it just beg a million questions? I think it would have made more sense to just throw out most of the 'questions' in these three films and focus on far fewer things. The Palpatine story could have been its own trilogy really. The dark Sith world could have been thoroughly explored instead of just becoming just another cool visual. The Knights of Ren could also have had their own story developed, or they wouldn't have to be mentioned at all. I just get the feeling JJ thought "The mighty Knights of Ren" sounded cool so he shoved that in there, with no further thought about it, or so it seems.
It's all superficial fluff...
C3PO - let's erase his brain because someone was capable of teaching him how to translate Sith but not allowing him to voice the translation without erasing his brain - how does that make any sense? Why give him the ability in the first place? Not one single other person/protocol droid has the ability? Ok let's do it, since we have no choice. Oh wait 20 min later R2D2 has a backup.
Leia dies sending one final message to Kylo to save Rey, which distracts him long enough to stab him but then we see her heal Ren, clumsily set up because she healed a giant snake earlier. But seemingly no ill effects from saving them. So you can heal people no prob but sending a message kills you umm ok.
Just like the other two sequels it comes off as we're seeing the writers behind the scenes rather than watch a story evolve logically and naturally. In TLJ why have space ships only be able to match speeds? The ships are really made so they run the same speed? Since when is that a thing? And if it is, why not have the bad guys light-speed jump-ahead and wait? Why in TFA did Kylo take Poe up to a ship after learning that he knew what happened to the map and then force-probe his mind on the ship only to have to go down to the planet again? And why do the same to Rey later? It's because the writers needed that to happen so other things could happen, that's why.
But hey bringing people back from the dead, wasn't that a major plot point in turning Anakin to the dark side, but hey Kylo can do that too but THAT kills you too.
This was a major thing for me. I feel they bent or expanded the rules of the force so much that now anything goes. Any future problem can be solved by just throwing in a new force power that was never well set up before. Sure, Anakin was told the dark side of the force could save people from dying, but I always took that as Palpatine fucking with him to get him to cross over, I never thought of that as being true. I mean, now that it is true, and now that they can apparently cross distances and grab physical objects, anything seems to go.
Chewie throws a fit when he learns Leia is dead but his remorse doesn't seem to match anyone else's reaction so it was just awkward and what about when Han died anyway?
JJ is a master of shallow emotions.
The only surprise to me with this trilogy is that each film felt like it exposed different problems to different degrees. TFA was a major soft-remake, lacked originality and was shallow / TLJ was just poorly written throughout and screwed with the mythology of the universe / TRoS was just a mess throughout all the aforementioned reasons....
/rant
