Star Wars: Episode VIII - The Last Jedi

Copied from my Letterboxd review:

This review may contain spoilers.

I'm going to be the stick in the mud and say that, personally, this movie was just all right.

First, I knew a lot of the cultural context about THE LAST JEDI before seeing it, so I've always known it as the "Adam Driver Shirtless High-Waisted Pants Meme" movie and the "Bullying Kelly Marie Tran Off the Internet" movie. So I had a lot of qualms going into this watch.

I agree with the person who said there's a really great 90-minute movie hidden in this 2 and a half hour movie. There is a great movie in here, but it's crowded with so much other stuff. Did we really need so many flashbacks of Luke and teen Kylo Ren's confrontation? Why were ALL the POC relegated to Canto Bight, while Rey and Kylo Ren were playing Force dyad tag? Where the hell was Poe?

I did like some things! I love BB-8 and yes, of course, I loved the Porgs. Give me a Porg and Ewok movie. Rose and Finn are cute, but I wish they were just a bit more connected to the main plot. I always love seeing Benicio Del Toro. The last hour is pretty fun and the action is very cool. The Luke twist is great, too. Laura Dern. I wanted more of Poe and Leia's dynamic! I laughed out loud when the Adam Driver shirtless scene arrived and Rey asks, "Do you have a cowl or something you could put on?" (I watched it several times).

That being said, the characterizations are a bit all over the place. Luke is a weird, bitter hermit and I get that Jedis are like monks, but this wasn't like Yoda and definitely not like Obi-Wan. Then there's the Kylo/Luke animosity, which...fell flat to me. That was it? Is this all it takes for men to hate each other for years? I wished we knew more about what led up to that fateful flashback BUT this franchise has enough prequels about the rise of a toxic man.

I was trying to give the Force Dyad a chance, but I'm not crazy about it being part of an attempted redemption of Ben/Kylo. I guess thinking "I can fix him" about the worst men imaginable is a young Jedi rite of passage.

But Kylo asking Rey to rule the empire with him after one (1) shirtless scene and some finger touching was unhinged. Someone is taking after his grandpa in the worst way.