For all it’s flaws (mainly floating Leia and the casino escapade) I think TLJ is more interesting than ROTS. I think what it tried to explore with Luke and the Jedi not being perfect was worth following up. Although I see why they didn’t because lots had a whinge about it.
This was was just a bit much at times. A group rapidly moving from finding one thing to another thing to another thing. It needed a bit more time to breathe. Not saying I hated it.
That said I think none were a disaster but that also none really hit their potential because mindbogglingly they didn’t have a story arc planned for all three. A shame as there were decent moments in all the films and some good performances and characters that.
Look, I really get what a lot of people are saying about this trilogy. We all knew that TFA was too derivative; and then people complained about the TLJ haters, saying that RJ had been brave to depart from the formula and got bitchslapped for his efforts, and as a consequence JJ had run back to nostalgia to appease the Star Wars Ultras.
But it all comes down to what has been said repeatedly: That nobody got everybody involved together in a room and said, "Okay, THIS is the arc. This, this and this DEFINITELY has to happen to tell THIS story. We can decide exactly which bits get told in which films, and the makers of each film can tell this plot points however way they like - but these ARE the plot points that MUST be told."
It just didn't happen. JJ set stuff up and basically trusted RJ to pick them up, and he decided not to. This goes against the grain of the previous two trilogies. It honestly would have been better if Lucas had just given them an outline and then let them have at it.
There were good bits to TLJ; but they were told badly - on top of a badly told story that made no sense and didn't go anywhere. I liked some of what you describe about Luke as well. It was just a missed opportunity and so Rise of Skywalker became all about damage control. Like I said, would have been better to split this final film into two and say, "Sod it, we're making four films".
Rey could have been revealed as a Palpatine without Palpatine needing to feature; but with the removal of Snoke a bad guy pulling the strings was needed. It's alluded that Snoke may have been a failed Palpatine clone, but the idea doesn't get any traction because they're trying to squeeze a four hour film into two hours or so.
I will always dislike TLJ because it comes across as an exercise in ego on the part of the director, who decided he knew better than everyone else. It's an arrogant film, not a groundbreaking one. For those complaining that Good v Evil is too simple a story to tell, that is exactly what Star Wars has always been about - the whole thing is a cliché machine. And if it's told properly it works, because that's how clichés become clichés.
As I said, Rise of Skywalker annoys me in several ways, but I give it some lattitude because of what it had to do. To those who dislike TLJ it justifies their criticisms of that film; and those who defend TLJ as a good movie will dislike that RoS attempts to invalidate their opinion on that film.
