Star Wars: The case for and against the sequel trilogy

Wasn’t Well Thought Out

One would think that when creating the sequels to arguably the biggest movies of all time, you’d have a well put together plan. The overall story arch of the sequel trilogy should at worst case at least be roughed out. This way each filmmaker can continue along the right course, while still putting their personal touches on the film they are directing. For whatever reason, money is probably a good guess, this wasn’t done, and the first film was put in theaters just a few years after Disney acquired the rights.

J.J. Abrams wrote and directed the first movie. He used his usual mystery box type of storytelling and filled the film with little bits of information here and there but not giving us answers to many of the questions the film raised. He also left the story open-ended with Rey meeting Luke and then fading to black. The film ended without revealing who Rey was. We also didn’t know much about this Snoke guy and why he was so powerful and able to seduce Ben Solo to the Dark Side.

This open-ended style of storytelling isn’t a good fit for a trilogy and gave Rian Johnson little to go on with the second film. He took his own liberties and made Rey a nobody and also killed off Snoke, making Kylo Ren the main villain.

In a move that showed the films weren’t thought out in advance,  J.J. Abrams brought back Palpatine and then made Rey his granddaughter. This was shoehorn storytelling and didn’t coincide with the other movies in the trilogy. If Palpatine was going to be brought back the whole time, it should’ve been alluded to earlier in the trilogy and all directors and writers working on this film should’ve been well aware of this important plot point. Instead, we get a series of films that are constantly retconning and changing already established plot points. It’s utterly confusing and a little embarrassing to watch.