Both are piles of crap for a lot of the same reasons, yet The Last Jedi still got great reviews from critics.
shareReviews today are part of a films marketing package I'm sure Disney bumped a generous amount of cash and offers to critics to boost The Last Jedi's box office results.
For The Rise of Skywalker the damage was done and they probably decided to just save the money considering even the TLJ marketed reviews backfired months later and it was obvious Disney was buying critics left and right.
Because The Last Jedi is the best movie since The Empire Strikes back. The Rise of Skywalker is merely the best movie since Solo.
shareThe critics were told to go easy on Last Jedi. The fans didn't buy it, though.
shareIf they could be told to go easy on TLJ, why wouldn't they be told to go easy on TROS?
shareGood question. I don't know. I can't explain anything happening in today's world.
shareI know critics do get paid off, pressured, or bullied into reviewing things well sometimes (Kane & Lynch), but in this case, the evidence points to no, just because - if Disney was going to rig the ratings - they would have done it for both films, right? And if it worked the first time, why not the second? So, until a few more puzzle pieces fall into place, I can't see how critics warped around The Last Jedi thanks to bribery or threats.
Now, I might fall back on a George Carlin quote, "You don't need a formal conspiracy when interests converge." So, in this instance, a lot of critics are feeling the need right now to give positive reviews to woke "culture". TLJ was perceived as, and both praised and derided for, its "wokeness". Critics might have felt they should be loving this movie. In fact, some might have gone into the film pre-judging it and having already made up their minds to dig the social justice Star Wars movie. TROS retconned a lot of TLJ, so maybe they disliked that it was backpedaling on the movie they loved.
I think the truth is more complex than that and a LOT of factors go into each critic's assessment of each film, including whatever is going on in the moment in their lives, what their friends think, the buzz is, etc. Of course, there's no accounting for taste, and they might have just liked it. Or, maybe they enjoyed themselves watching TFA, so that goodwill stayed over as they watched TLJ. That movie stunk, the sour taste got in their mouths, but it was a slow-burn sour taste they never could quite put their fingers on...so when TROS came out, let's just fry it. Like a delayed-reaction review. The last one generated good/bad will among fans, I'll give the next one a positive/negative review.
Who knows?
Maybe Di$ney had already scammed enough money by this point to feel it was unnecessary to bribe the critiques with a combination of the critiques wanting to preserve some semblance of credibility by praising a complete turd that the fans almost universally hated.
shareDidn't the 2009 Star Trek reboot movie go pretty much the same. I seem to recall a lot of love for it when it was first out, but nowadays, it seems like everyone says it's horrible.
sharePersonally, I think critics gave this bad reviews because fans talked so much shit about critics liking TLJ. It became some weird war of words between the the groups. Every day Collider and Nerdist were pumping out articles about how much they hated it and every article had comments from fans giving them shit for it. Hell, I just saw one yesterday on the anniversary of this movie's release.
shareI thought Collider was in Disney's pockets
shareThis is from 4 days ago.
"One Year Later, ‘Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker’ Still Sucks"
https://collider.com/star-wars-the-rise-of-skywalker-still-bad/
People finally broke out of their denial. I remember "The Force Awakens" was originally praised by everyone, but now it seems that one's hated now as well.
shareI haven't watched either 2. I guess I am just too old now and only care for the original trilogy. The 'Star Wars Universe' just got too big for me to keep track of things. Baby Yoda's cool though.
Anyway, my observation is this: The Last Jedi decided to go for their own direction. Love it or hate it; they went somewhere new and different and the critics loved it, even if the fans hated what they did to characters. But it stood with it's guns and did it's thing. Then Rise of Skywalker comes along and attempts to 'correct' stuff that was done in part 2 instead of just going with the story and pushing forward. Critics, may have seen this as a cowardly move. And instead of having something fresh with a strong ending, you got time wasted on course correcting as well as fitting new story and characters into the plot. TL;Dr version ...'Jedi' is seen as the stronger piece and 'Rise' was trying to apologize for it.
Just my thoughts
for someone who hasn't seen either of them, i'd say your take is remarkably spot on.
i don't hate the last jedi myself. i think it's got some decent moments, and it has a coherent story. i find it underwhelming in lots of ways - moments that are supposed to be impactful had none to me - but it goes from a to b to c in a proper, recognizable way.
ros is just a mad jumble of running and jumping here and there and going on a quest and surprises that might be surprising, but nothing had been planted in the earlier films that would give that any meaning. it all felt like desperation.
Thanks. I try not to hate anything just because they change a character or plot but that doesn't mean I have to pay money to see it. yea...I prefer not to pay $20-$30 to see my precious Luke grossly milking a space cow and acting like an asshole...but that's just me. But I do read articles and get the jist of what's going on and I find it interesting in a directing/writing/acting point of view.
i will admit, I saw a clip where Luke is 'training' Rey and does this thing with a piece of grass on her hand and he's mocking her about feeling the Force. That was pretty funny.
And instead of having something fresh with a strong ending, you got time wasted on course correcting as well as fitting new story and characters into the plot.
Oh I completely agree. I feel like there was a major bait and switch between Force Awakens and The Last Jedi. Disney was walking a egg shells with the fans when making Force Awakens and did everything in their power to make it just new enough to start a new trilogy but familiar enough for the fans who were feeling nervous after the prequels. And as soon as people felt secure and on board with the new trilogy and characters, they completely turn the story into this over dark, character ruining, screw the fans kind of film. And there is no going back from something like that.
I will still never understand the greed and need to quickly throw something out there when they could have done a LotR with it and made all the films at once or at least had a whole 3 part story written first. This preference to 'write as we go' just doesn't work any more for these stories.
Disney put JJ in as the new guy to lead the Star Wars franchise then don't give him any say input on where the story goes next? Only to bring him back to 'fix' what happened before? Nonsense; absolute nonsense. You have to know who these characters are and where they are going. Instead, they focused on woke nonsense and female power and other kind of politics. It's a major reason I refused to watch after Force Awakens. I liked Fin and Po and it sounds like they totally gave them both the shaft in order to force this ridiculous Rey is amazing story line.
That's why I just calm myself down and stick to my original trilogy. I let all the other craziness float away and just remember the movie without all these extra bells and whistles.