Here’s a pretty good article about the film: https://www.avclub.com/part-kurosawa-part-wile-e-coyote-the-last-jedi-boldl-1821291545
RE: Ackbar vs. Holdo, the author of this piece has a good point in a response to a comment:
Lotta folks seem to think that her role should have gone to good ol’ Admiral Ackbar, but I get Johnson’s intention: Everybody likes Ackbar, and the audience needs to be fooled into Poe’s point-of-view.
This completely. The other thing about Ackbar is… I’m sorry guys, he’s kind of a joke. When he showed up in TLJ everyone laughed. I think a lot of peeople wouldn’t buy the drama of him in an expanded role.
JEDIT: I need to be better about keeping all my responses in one post, rather than 4 back to back.