I'm seeing a lot of animosity toward the sequels over in the ranking thread. That's fine, people are entitled to their opinions, but I thought I might offer another perspective. First, a little bit of my background with Star Wars. I'm 40. Just young enough that I didn't catch any of the originals in theatres. I was not a huge fan growing up, so I don't remember seeing the re-releases in the 90s, either. My first theatrical experience with Star Wars was The Phantom Menace. So when someone says something "feels like Star Wars," that's always my first frame of reference. I do love the original trilogy, but the prequels, especially ROTS, will always hold a special place in my heart. But like any fan paying attention, I had some issues. Sometimes the acting was uneven. Some of the dialogue was terrible. There was a significant lack of chemistry between the leads in the prequels. And so much of the development of the female characters, particularly in the prequels, seemed to be in fan service to straight men. Seriously, there's no reason for Padme to be in a midriff top for the arena fight. Lucas was guilty of doing this with Leia, as well, but she was an all-around more well-developed and interesting character. Padme often seems to exist solely as a repository for Anakin's unruly emotions. And yet, mainly on the strength of Ian McDiarmid's performance as Palpatine, I love ROTS most of all.

Anyway, moving on to the prequels, I was super excited that we were getting more Star Wars. I remember seeing the first trailers and the revelation of a black stormtrooper. The speculation around what his importance might be. The excitement of seeing Han, Chewie, and the Millennium Falcon again. From what I can recall, no one knew anything about Rey, or much seemed to care. I assumed the series would revolve around Finn. So it was a great and wonderful surprise when Rey turned out to be the central character, and one powerful in the Force. Maybe most surprising of all, the filmmakers made no effort to make Rey "sexy." They just let her exist as a character, just like the men. I loved just about every minute of The Force Awakens.

Like everyone, I have some issues with The Last Jedi. Leia flying through space after being blown up. The side trip to Canto Bight that yielded almost nothing. Luke milking whatever that thing was. Still, the movie added to Rey's mystique and provided what I think of as one of the best lightsaber battles in the series. I actually liked grumpy Luke, for the most part--he's not an idealistic kid anymore, and he shouldn't be. The world has let him down. He has let himself down. I think he's living with a profound shame and guilt, and has a hard time thinking he still has something to contribute. Bu enough psychobabble. The Last Jedi is far from a perfect movie, but I still appreciate it as Star Wars.

Moving on to The Rise of Skywalker, I was again sooooo excited. It was clear that Palpatine was back, and I couldn't wait to see what they would do with the character. As I already mentioned, I love Ian McDiarmid as an actor, and I was over the moon about seeing him in that part again. The movie obviously didn't disappoint on that score--lots of great scenes with Palpatine, plenty of menace and suspense. Unlike The Last Jedi, the movie did not feel overly long or bloated, and all the "side trips" seemed important to the story. We got an explanation of Rey's parentage that made some sense, and support for the idea that she and Ben have a special bond in the Force. We got lots of great visuals and space adventures. There are quibbles, such as the sidelining of Rose (seriously, they should have subtitled this one "The Friend Zone"), but, like TFA, I basically loved this movie from beginning to end.

As a group, the sequels are not a perfect trilogy. There are missteps and things I don't like about them. But they offer so much to the Star Wars universe that's new and needed. A hero other than a white male. Women who are valued for more than their ability to look sexy. And they develop some of the great themes that already existed in Star Wars--courage, friendship, faith. Now, to some people, this may look like "pandering" to "SJWs." There may well be some of that, particularly in TLJ. However, I see it more as opening the galaxy up and recognizing that Star Wars should never have been just for one type of person. Representation matters. How characters are represented matters. And the sequels, while not perfect, make a valiant effort at encompassing a broader spectrum of carbon-based life-form experience.

My Dad introduced me to Star Wars 1-6 on DVD when I was a boy, fell in love with the movies and I collected all types of toys such as Lego Star Wars. Been a nerd for Star Wars ever since.

If the only way for the writers to make the characters relatable is to make the cast diverse, then the characters aren't good in the first place. Don't get me wrong; Oscar, John, and Daisy are all good actors who got selected for the role based on their own talents. But many people go around saying the fact that Finn and Rey are good characters because more people (Black people + women) can relate to them. This is completely wrong. Good acting skills, (which I believe they do possess) and good writing (Where I believe the sequels fall short) make good characters.

Finn in TFA was really exciting to me, not because he was black, but because he was an average Joe turned into a Resistance hero who took on Kylo on his own. Any excitement I had for him was flushed down the toilet by the very awful Canto Bight subplot.

Jynn Erso is all round fantastic character, and they do not shoehorn the fact that she is a woman. The good writing and good acting of Jynn's character makes her fantastic and makes her relatable not because she is a women, but because she is well written.

I know this is pretty subjective stuff, but my point is why do people care about race and gender of characters? To be completely honest, I think the TV shows of star wars outshines the majority of the movies. And there is plenty of well-written characters who aren't 'whites males' in these types of media. We don't even know who the Mandalorian is, he could be a woman with a voice changer for all we know. We haven't seen the Mandalorian's face, but I am way more emotionally invested in his character than anyone from the sequel trilogy. Ahsoka is one of my favourite Star Wars characters, and Mace Windu is a pure badass.

A lot of people just watch the movies, which is fine. But I find it annoying when people complain that Star Wars isn't 'diverse enough,' but if they just dig a little deeper they would find lots of characters that 'represent them.'

Fucking dreck sacrificed on the altar of feminism.

Not canon.

Hahaha yes the whole Death Star thing is hilarious at this point. I can picture the board meeting after Force Awakens.

Imperial Officer: "So we tried the Death Star, tried the Death Star again, did a much larger planet-sized Death Star and none of those worked."
Palpatine: "How about little itty bitty ship Death Stars! We could put one on each Star Destroyer and then just have them all parked together in a dangerous location that all rely on a single transmitter to keep them from crashing or being trapped forever."
Imperial Officer: "Alright ignoring that last part because that just doesn't make any sense. I really think we just need to move away from the Death Star thing, it has literally not worked out for us. How about just investing in more troops and ships to secure the galaxy, maybe bring back the inquisitors or something, we had twenty years of good imperial rule before we got all Death Star-obsessed."
Palpatine: "Its settled then, itty bitty Death Star Destroyers!"
Imperial Officer: ".........."

At the end of RotJ, Luke was the hero who showed courage and resisted the temptation to darkness and saw the good in Vader. In Episode 8, Luke was a coward who wanted to kill a nephew that he could not see good in (who ultimately turned back to the light nonetheless). Luke's primary characteristics were negated in the sequel trilogy. A little bit of redemption through the Crait battle and episode 9's "regretful Force ghost", but the damage was done.

At the end of RotJ, Han and Leia had their happy-ending kiss and in both canon and Legends they were married and had a family. The sequel trilogy turned their happily-ever-after into a distant separation. Han had an on-screen good-bye without ever seeing Luke.

At the end of RotJ, the Emperor and the Empire were defeated. Even in Legends, there was an Imperial remnant. But somehow the First Order quickly took over the galaxy again by destroying five planets. The Emperor was defeated but reappears with no explanation.

The Jedi were the good guys. The Sith were the bad guys. Instead of reforming the Jedi, the Jedi just need to end?Certainly some things could have been reformed. Celibacy for the knights is kind of silly. The logic behind that is presumably so they don't have too much attachment - so the answer to stop hate is to not love? And for both Luke and the rerun with Rey, Palpatine tries to bait them into killing him to turn dark. As if killing evil is itself evil? Defeating evil is a good thing. So, yeah, there's some silliness in Jedi teaching, but instead of talking about reformation of the Jedi, nah, let's just burn the tree.

Instead of building on the end of RotJ (i.e. introducing a new conflict with existing characters as well as newly introduced characters) they did the exact opposite. They rehashed the old conflicts - Death Star variants, the Empire v2, and Palpatine again. They did introduce new characters, but the storylines of the OT characters were largely turned on their heads in comparison to how their stories had ended.

R2-D2 and C-3PO weren't changed, and they had about the same prominence that they had in the prequels. So, hey, well done on those two, I guess. Although really R2 could have just played BB-8's role from the beginning.

So before I get started I want to say I have so far really enjoyed reading everyone's very thoughtful commentary on this.

Flying Arrow could not have said it better regarding the endless rehash. Honestly, the second Death Star in ROTJ was a little weak but it worked as a plot device to put everyone in the right place at the right time. I think it was even weaker to do it again in 7 and 9, especially when it seemed like JJ was just trying to up the ante rather than tell a solid story.

Not EVERYTHING about the sequels is bad. Daisey Ridley has a very nice screen presence and so does John Boyega. Honestly, Boyega's performance was one of the few things that I truly enjoyed in 9.

However, when compared to the pre-existing EU stories where the characters grew rather than regressed, this was kind of hard to swallow. The Force Awakens was not necessarily a bad movie. It was entertaining but it was also a "soft reboot" of a universe that really didn't need that. Having a female as the lead force using character is a great idea. Lucas' story was like that as well. However, retelling EP4 with new characters was a really weak move especially when you consider that George Lucas always strived to add depth and newness to the universe with each saga installment. I have perceived Kylo Ren and Snoke as very derivative and uninteresting from this movie forward. And I still don't understand why the established government (The New Republic) needs a resistance. Why aren't they just the New Republic? In the same breath, what was wrong with the Imperial Remnant? (yes, I know this was addressed in EP9, but again not very well).

For me, despite at times feeling quite irritating and gender biased, The Last Jedi was the only film in this trilogy that is even close to decent. And it does have problems. I applaud Rian Johnson's efforts to at least create something new here. I am not going to comment much on the politics of the movie. However, I will say I am more than fed up with Hollywood attempting to attack people who are not liberals. I consider myself to be a liberal person but I also honor personal freedom (enough about me, right!?!?) and at the end of the day current social politics should be left outside of entertainment most of the time, especially by a company as two-faced as Disney. I think Luke being in hiding and possibly even considering walking away from the force is an interesting idea, but I think his character is portrayed as heavy-handedly as Anakin was in the prequels. That just was not Luke Skywalker to me. Especially when you consider that he would have had the support of Obi and Yoda, and even his father and Qui-Gon to get him through. Yoda's appearance/role was bizarre. He looked kind of like Yoda, sounded a little like him, and even said things like him, but in the end just came across as an imposter to me. It was as if he was saying things that sounded like something Yoda would say, but lacked his true wisdom. This film was probably Daisey Ridley's best performance and despite her time with Luke being strange I enjoyed her character developing a little. Finn and Poe's stories, while seriously overcooked, had some value. Poe was a hot-shot but I don't think anyone needed the "listen to your mom" message (could have been done differently). Finn spent his whole life as a stormtrooper and I think Rose teaching him the importance of serving others was actually a good thing. On the other hand the Del Toro character and the return of Phasma where underwhelming and seemed to lack a point other than him triumphing over an old oppressor. Luke dying after using that force power was just dumb. Rian Johnson pulled this right out of an old metaphysical book called "Life and Teachings of the Master of the Far East." Except in that book they don't die after using it. And I actually thought Leia's Mary Poppins force power was kind of cool. I have always viewed her as being more of a consular so it worked for me, that said it did seem a little OP. My main issue with this film is the that both the dialogue and story revolved around killing the past, which to me is symbolized by both Ackbar and Luke's deaths and wanting to destroy the Jedi order. I felt like Disney was literally saying to the audience: "This is ours now, we don't care about the older media, we are doing what we want with it." Finally, no one lost a hand in this movie!!! WTF

The Rise of Skywalker. I read/watched a couple reviews. Two of my closest friends saw it and told me it wasn't great but better than the other 2. Despite everything I was open-minded. There really was no way for me to be disappointed by the movie but I was open to being pleasantly surprised. I wasn't. For me it was not just a bad star wars movie. It was just a bad movie altogether. It nullified Poe's character development from TLJ. Added way too many new characters (pushing for additional shows/movies/books/comics). The force powers were all way too overpowered, almost like in the Force Unleashed (I liked the game but didn't think it should be canon). Tried way too hard at fan appeasement. The explanations felt tired and lame. Everything was crammed together and went so fast it took me 3 days to process all of it. Rey was overpowered and her DNA was not enough to explain it and Ben Solo should not have ascended (neither of them had the training to explain what they accomplished). Leia's death was just as lame as Luke's. Ian McDiarmid couldn't even save this for me. Once again his role in this film just felt like JJ trying to up the ante rather than relying on good storytelling. Through most of the movie I was just checking the time to see how soon it would be over. I laughed a few times but not at the jokes but at how ridiculous the events, powers, or technology (death star-star destroyers) were. Overall this movie felt to me like a 10 year old surrounded by action figures coming up with the most epic story possible to end it all so that he or she could retire their toys and go through puberty. Star Wars has always been made for children. It shouldn't seem like it was made by children. There were a handful of things I liked though. Visually it looked amazing. I liked how the entire galaxy rose up together to defeat evil. Rey sledding down the hill at the end like she was child was unexpectedly endearing and I liked her new lightsaber. I thought her adopting the Skywalker name was nice as she realized that Luke and Leia were her spiritual family, not her grandfather. The festival was fun. I kind of appreciated the symbolism of Kylo Ren dying after Rey stabbed with his lightsaber. Ben Solo's conversation with Han was done well and somewhat moving.

I really hope JJ Abrahms never makes another Star Wars movie. If Rian Johnson gets another chance I would hope they give him a lot more time to put the story together and that he dials down the sociopolitical themes.

Were the prequels flawed? Absolutley. But I love them despite their awkwardness because the story was great and inspiring. I will take that any day of over what Disney did with the sequel trilogy.

EDIT: after writing this it dawned on my that both Luke and Leia died while sacrificing themselves. At least I think that was the point, which I think is actually pretty cool. I'm not really sure how I feel about the force powers themselves causing their death especially in movies where the use of the force seemed overpowered. I take back some of what I said about that, it was at least thoughtful and consistent with how Obi died.

Yeah, I think they both were great choices for the movies. I think they would have been great in Lucas' version as well.

In 8 I felt the Rey/Ren storyline was pretty good. I was never really convinced that Kylo was considering the light, but he definitely makes you think he is. Good acting and writing for that arc.