Jacob Goldman

Firstly, I'm giving this movie three stars based on its performance alone in the trilogy and giving credit where credit is due to JJ. I think it speaks volumes to his skill as a director for him to make this movie after Rian Johnson walked in and took a proverbial dump on the floor. Given the circumstances that JJ had to work with on this movie, I believe that he delivered the best outcome possible. He had to salvage the trilogy after the dumpster fire that was TLJ. He had to contend with Kathleen Kenney's constant micromanaging and obsession with trying to make this movie a comedy for some reason. I'm not saying this movie was amazing however, I walked into the theater expecting it to be terrible, but was surprised at just how well JJ pulled a rather decent ending. If he directed every movie, we would've had the amazing trilogy that you'd expect of Star Wars. You can tell that the actors put their heart and soul into this one. The cinematography is exactly what you'd expect from a director with JJ's experience. The plot is lacking at times and awkwardly paced, but I think we can safely assume that's because JJ couldn't competely disregard what happened in TLJ. Overall, I'm torn as to whether or not to actually recommend seeing it in theater. On one hand, I would like to see it underperform so that Iger and Disney can have an excuse to push Kennedy out the door. But on the other hand, it's a reasonably good movie and Star Wars after all.