If you don’t want to be spoiled, head over here to our spoiler-free reviews by Brian J. Robb and Alasdair Stuart. Below, Nick Joy and Greg D. Smith discuss the movie in more detail:

The dwindling fleet of Resistance ships finds itself relentlessly pursued by the First Order’s Star Destroyer’s – will Rey be able convince fabled Jedi Luke Skywalker out of self-imposed exile before it’s too late?

The Last Jedi has seemingly performed some mind control over critics, convincing them ‘this is the movie you’re looking for’, while a large section of fandom is kicking back, disagreeing that it’s the best Star Wars movie since The Empire Strikes Back, criticising its story decisions, bloated running time and the way it plays fast and loose with established mythology.

Let’s look at the positives before raking over the coals. John Williams’ score continues to be  the glue that holds this universe together, recording original motifs and creating new anthems – he’s peerless in this field. The spaceship special effects are also top drawer – the explosions pack a huge punch, and the level of detail in the CGI has never been better.  And arguably most movies are 50% better by having puppet Yoda in them – Frank Oz’ unexpected return being a real treat.

John Boyega’s Finn and Adam Driver’s Kylo Ren both feel more rounded this time, though Daisy Ridley’s Rey sounded a little wooden on occasion. And Kelly Marie Tran makes a fine entry as Rose.

So, what exactly is annoying the hardcore? Mark Hamill himself has publicly stated that he didn’t buy the way that Luke’s character was taken, and it’s a concern shared by many. Exiled on a distant planet where he extracts blue milk from multi-breasted herbivores, he refuses to help Rey, carrying guilt from his inability to stop Ben Solo from turning to the Dark Side. It’s only after he sees the strength inherent in Rey and had had a pep talk from Yoda that he gets his groove back and projects a realistic version of himself across the galaxy to take on the First Order. Wait, he does what? That’s right, Jedi can do that now, as well as survive in the vacuum of space and fly Peter Pan-like out of a debris field towards another ship.

I just don’t buy this expansion of the Jedi powers. Yes, just because we haven’t seen these powers before doesn’t mean they didn’t exist, but they are here purely to serve the current story rather than respecting pre-established mythology. I don’t have an issue with change, I have an issue with clunky plot developments that should have been resolved within the constraints of the existing world.

I also have concerns with this trilogy’s continued predilection with revisiting set pieces from previous entries. The Death Star got a makeover last time round and now we have new versions of the Emperor’s Throne Room, the attack on Hoth and Luke’s training on Dagobah. Although their faults are many, the movies in the prequel trilogy were at least very different to Episodes IV, V and VI, rather than serving up ‘best of’ recreations.

The showdown with Snoke and subsequent battle with his guards is a great set piece, but feels like we’ve squandered a decent villain. In close-up he’s a grotesque CGI-rendered tyrant, voiced by a chilling Andy Serkis (though he moves a bit jerkily in some long shots) but is sliced in half before we really get to know him. It’s a shock moment, and leads to a great smack down between Kylo, Rey and the Praetorian guards, their weapons offering all manner of cool utilities.

Poe feels less developed this time, a cocky flyboy who just wants to blow stuff up. He matures a little at the end, but it’s a fairly one-dimensional character. Finn and Rose’s trip to casino planet Canto Bight feels like it could easily be excised to improve the overall pace – it feels like something from The Fifth Element by way of another alien cantina. Of course, what we didn’t realise was that Rose had rapidly fallen in love with Finn, and would soon be rescuing him from his suicide mission.

As the dust settles at the end of the movie, we know that Leia won’t be able to return following Carrie Fisher’s passing, Han is dead and Luke is now presumably a space Jedi – though as Yoda demonstrated this time round, you can still interact with the real world and set trees on fire, even as a ghost. This means that all the heavy-lifting will be left to the new human characters.

I’m not even too worried that we didn’t really find out anything definite about Rey’s parentage – maybe her parents really were junk traders rather than Jedi. It’s the quippy Avengers-style template being used here that gives me more concern, showing the Disney template at work, making their franchises more homogeneous.

Verdict: Another Star Wars victory lap, pillaging from past glories – I’m inclined to call it Return of the Empire Strikes Back. Let’s hope J J Abrams pulls something out of the bag for the final instalment. 7/10

Nick Joy

So, two years later, here is the movie that should give us all the answers to the many mysteries left dangling at the end of 2015’s The Force Awakens. Now we can finally find out who Rey’s parents were, who Snoke is and what he’s up to, and what really happened at the Jedi Temple between Luke and Kylo Ren. Great, right?

Well, that rather depends – to paraphrase Old Ben Kenobi – on your point of view. Answers are certainly forthcoming, but they aren’t necessarily going to satisfy everyone.

If there’s a theme running through this movie, it’s one of subversion. Rian Johnson knows what fans might expect from a Star Wars movie, and he often teases that you might be about to get it, but then he definitively changes tack and delivers something very different. So yes, we get told who Rey’s parents are, eventually, and it turns out that no, she’s not a Kenobi or a Skywalker or any of the other convoluted theories that paralysed comments sections and forums for 24 months, she’s just the progeny of literal nobodies, who are already dead and buried.

With Snoke, we get a glimpse of his power, and we are told a little more about how he found Ren and what his plans are (and they aren’t very subtle – use Rey to find Luke and then kill them both) but then just as we are warming to what is clearly going to be another Palpatine, oh dear, he’s not going anywhere anymore. And even at that point, Johnson pulls another surprise out of the hat – as we see the carnage of the throne room around them, and Ren reaches out to Rey, it turns out that no, he’s not his grandfather in any sense of the matter, and rather than struggling between the darkness and light in his soul, he just wants to rule the galaxy with Rey by his side. Some may insist on a strong parallel between Empire and this, but there’s a very different sense to the whole thing – when Vader implores Luke to join him and end the destructive conflict, there’s an edge of desperation there, a feeling that Vader senses his only chance at redemption in the son he only recently found he had. With Ren, it’s an alliance of convenience, a chance to increase his power and crush any and all opposition to him.

What this all adds up to is a film which very distinctly feels like something different. Johnson isn’t here to destroy the Star Wars mythos that went before, but nor will he be beholden to it. There’s a very clear sense of the pieces being swept off the board, of the galaxy changing. The Resistance is no longer able to pull one cocky hero out of the bag to save everyone (and indeed, Poe Dameron’s journey in this film is that sentiment writ large) and they are going to struggle. Much like Rogue One before it, you get a genuine sense of a small, outnumbered band of desperate rebels being slowly and inexorably ground beneath the heels of a larger, more powerful military organisation. And the sort of individual, devil-may-care antics of Poe, which would in past Star Wars films have resulted in the day being saved, here just create more problems, more bodies, and fewer avenues of retreat. Some may feel that Dameron’s treatment by the narrative is overly harsh, but it feels like a point the director is determined to make sure both the character, and the audience, take away.

That ties in with Luke’s arc as well – the former hero, now hiding at the other end of the galaxy, is a very different creature from what audiences might expect. Indeed, when he sneers at Rey, early on,  ‘What did you expect? That Luke Skywalker would emerge with his laser sword and take on the entire First Order?’ it’s caustic, but also prescient of both the ending and the theme of the movie. Because although Johnson is building a galaxy where that sort of one-man heroics doesn’t actually fly, he’s also building one in which those sorts of legends can build hope. The payoff, with Luke’s final appearance and how it plays out, simultaneously destroys what fans may expect to happen at the end of a Star Wars movie, while also reinforcing the notion that legends are what keep people fighting when all the odds are against them. Although nobody ever actually says ‘Rebellions are built on hope’ in this one, that message is written through every strand of its DNA.

There are other elements that cement the movie – the observation, in a sequence that at first seems out of place, that war has no real ‘good’ or ‘bad’ people, just people on opposite sides and that ultimately the winners are the people selling both sides their weapons. The humour, which some will instinctively rail against, and which feels distinctly (and unsurprisingly) Marvel-esque.

But unlike Rogue One, which did these things as well, this movie never feels like it’s shackled to its predecessors. There is no sense, by the end credits, that 2019’s as yet untitled Episode IX will end up being a revisit of Return of the Jedi. No sense that things will fall neatly into any preconceived boxes. The board has been cleared, the hero of the day no longer has to be a Skywalker, the villain of the piece no longer a conflicted antihero, and the answers to the problems no longer one man beating the odds to make a lucky, one-in-a-million shot. To paraphrase another franchise altogether: it’s Star Wars, but not as we know it. And honestly? That’s a good thing.

Verdict: It won’t be for everyone – people who both loved and hated The Force Awakens will find things here not to their taste. But it’s undoubtedly the bravest, freshest, and most ambitious cinematic take on the Star Wars universe in years, and it’ll have you thinking about it for weeks afterwards, whatever your feelings on it. For a blockbuster franchise movie produced by the biggest entertainment conglomerate on the planet, that’s some achievement. 10/10

Greg D. Smith