I just wrote my review of TLJ on IMDB:
This so called "sequel" feels like a joke parody of Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens, which was criticized for being a rehash of the original Star Wars. This movie feels like it is overreacting to that criticism by parodying The Force Awakens - it blatantly copies visuals and recreates scenes from The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi and just flips or twists the result of each scene. At one point it gets so close to plagiarism that they have an extra break the fourth wall to taste the ground and tell us "This is not Hoth because it's a salt planet, not a snow planet". I literally laughed out loud at certain scenes with dialogue ripped straight from Return of the Jedi ("I feel the conflict in you", "Now...fulfill...your...DESSSTINNYYYYY!") My cousin sitting next to me in the theater laughed in reaction to my laughter.
Recreating scenes from the older movies and just tweaking or twisting the result of the scene is not original at all if you ask me. It gets so predictable and annoying when you have a "GOTCHA!" moment every 10 minutes. It's like the writer/director is trolling the audience.
The 1st draft of the film's screenplay was used....and it was mostly complete while Lucasfilm was making The Force Awakens. This is mind blowing that a major company would handle a billlion dollar franchise this way. Letting one director come in and just write his own thing while having no idea what the next film's director and writer will do to finish the trilogy. It's the polar opposite of what Marvel Studios did when they mapped out a 10 year plan for the MCU movies. They didn't have a detailed outline but they did have a broad one and stuck to it for the most part with minor adjustments (including Spider-man was not planned until Marvel made a deal with Sony in 2015). But back to Lucasfilm and their lack of a plan for this new trilogy....
What kind of business decision is this? Just letting some 40 year old guy come in write Luke to be as unlikable as possible, only to have a forced "redemption" arc before dying? They seriously didn't think that would anger a large group of fans??
They took an adventure fantasy franchise aimed at people of all ages and cultures....and turned it into slow space chase scene...like Mad Max Fury Road in space at 1 mile per hour with the story revolving around the rebels running out of fuel...it's even more boring on film than it sounds. Maybe a more apt title would have been Star Wars: The Last Gallon.
And on top of that the movie is insulting to the audience when it starts trying to preach to us about Western politics and social issues.....in an adventure escapist fun franchise that is supposed to entertain people of all ages from all cultures around the world?? Lucasfilm, what were you thinking?!
Disney, you gotta micromanage Lucasfilm more now because it's clear that Kathleen Kennedy doesn't know what she is doing and prioritizing pushing her agenda over quality filmmaking. On the other hand, Disney, you can let Marvel Studios continue to do their thing because Kevin Feige clearly knows what he's doing and has always had a vision for the MCU. Kennedy clearly doesn't. She's not even a Star Wars fan and has not once even talked about Star Wars in interviews other than mentioning how cute Porgs are or how cute BB8 is...or how "strong" the women in this film are.
The box office results of this film worldwide show that it is universally disliked. It got pulled from theaters in China after less than two weeks. A Chinese news article was written in which the writer talks about how Chinese viewers felt that the movie insulted their intelligence with how the characters make inexplicably stupid decisions.
In South Korea...The Force Awakens was a good start by raking in 24 million dollars (prior to that the highest grossing SW film in Korea was ROTS which grossed 10 million).....well, this sequel only grossed 1/3 of what The Force Awakens did in Korea (7.9 million..by comparison Avengers: Infinity War made 88.5 million in S. Korea).
In Thailand the movie was also generally hated by audiences. My Thai friend told me all about it and I am in Thailand as I write this review.
So the narrative in the media that the people who hate this film are mostly toxic, racist, misogynistic, white conservatives is just not true. People noticed that Spiderman Homecoming clearly had a left leaning political agenda when Peter Partker's high school is shown to be the most ethnically diverse place seen on film...more than a college brochure, the students all being Indian, Philipino, East Asian, black, Middle Eastern, Hispanic etc. but it didn't bother audiences because the movie was enjoyable. The Last Jedi was not enjoyable.
Did Disney even watch over the production of this film? Did anyone? How the script got green lit is baffling. Not one executive read the script and went "Wait a minute...maaaybe we shouldn't kill off Luke Skywalker like that" or "Wait a minute...maaybe we shouldn't have Luke even think about murdering his own nephew in his sleep"??
What do I like about the movie? Mark Hamill's performance is really good, though maybe because he was truly miserable and pissed off during filming out of anger at Rian Johnson's portrayal of Luke (go watch "50 times Mark Hamill tried to subtly warn us about The Last Jedi on youtube). The film is visually stunning and has great set pieces (which is partly why the plot holes go unnoticed by many people, in my opinion. I think the beautiful visuals hypnotized me on my first watch and it was on my 2nd viewing I realized how awful the movie is)..........I can't think of anything else I liked about the film.
The job of act 2 in a trilogy is to set up hooks for people to anticipate the final act.....this movie did nothing...nothing to set up the 3rd and final movie of this trilogy. It didn't give us new characters to care about except an Asian American stereotypical nerdy girl who looks like she is from our own galaxy...not a galaxy far far away. It didn't develop new plot threads that we are supposed to be excited to see resolved....it actually ends with a finality tone that makes the viewer feel like it's the end of this saga and setting up a future Star Wars Saga 10 or 20 years later with all new characters. The movie hit the reset button....not only did it hit the reset button....but it walked a hundred steps backwards after resetting everything to Empires vs. a tiny rebel group. JJ has a near impossible task ahead of him now.
It's honestly easier for JJ Abrams to wrap up the 9 part "Skywalker Saga" in a nice bow with Episode IX if he pretends The Last Jedi never happened. Let that sink in. It's crazy.
What a colossal disaster.