Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker (2019)
J.J.Abrahms really knows how to mix that Star Wars secret sauce like nobody else (even Lucas) so the tone and the feels were spot on again for me. Sadly the script, or more importantly the plotting is a (sometimes needlessly) convoluted mess with too many characters (even if they are characters I liked). Partly this is the fault of the last film because it threw out all the potential from 'The Force Awakens' and replaced it with nothing, so this third film effectively has to start again from scratch and finish off the trilogy at the same time. If only Disney had been patient enough to wait for J.J. to be available to direct all three films, I think we'd have had a great run of films. I got goosebumps in a few moments and shared a genuine fist pump in the air with a fellow viewer when a certain grumpy Scotsman made a cameo. At a certain point I stopped even trying to work out the justifications and logic of the events and just enjoyed the spectacle and drama. Of the nine films in this "saga", I'd place it at number 5, a good distance back from TFA but a mile ahead of TLJ and a light year ahead of the prequels. I'm looking forward to seeing it a second time but I know some of the plot contrivances may grate more on closer inspection.
In fanediting terms at least this time we've got a film that just needs a bit of streamlining and adjustment, rather than something so tonally wrong it's hard to get your head round how to fix it (like the last film). Take out characters dying but then not dying, references to plot elements that aren't resolved, hopefully add some deleted dialogue scenes etc and you'd have something I can happily enjoy. I'd be curious to see how short you could get an edit of TLJ if you only retained the material important to bridge the two J.J. films?