Salzmank Watches “Star Wars”

Well, I finished it. I’m not quite sure what to think. There’s some really great stuff in it, and I loved Darth Vader at the end. The way they shot him showed everything that impressed me about the character when I first watched these movies so long ago (). And it’s neat how everything ties in at the end (though, to be nitpicky, it doesn’t exactly seem like the ending of this and the beginning of Star Wars match up), and I was very impressed by good performances all-around.

But I felt more for Mikkelson and his family in the beginning than I did for our band of heroes at the end, and there was the constant niggling feeling (until the end) that none of this needed to be set in space (For Whom the Bell Tolls, eh?).

It’s good at replicating the set-design and general world, but as I wrote there are points where I would never mistake this for anything other than a modern blockbuster. It’s missing a unique mixture of comedy, drama, war, horror, science fiction, and fantasy that Spooky Ghost Ackbar has noted characterizes Star Wars. And CGI Cushing and Fisher creeped me out, reflexively and ethically. There are moments where it looks like ever other Hollywood blow ’er extravaganza to be viewed and quickly forgotten and moments where it looks unique and different.

So I’m mixed. But it’s definitely better than The Force Awakens and especially The Last Jedi.