At first I didn’t understand why TLJ left so little story threads for future entries, feeling more like the final act of a story, than the middle one. In the context of what I wrote above it makes perfect sense. Future Star Wars movies won’t have these connective tissues like in the past, because it prevents the general audience from connecting with it, or worse even go and see it, since they need to have seen the previous entries to fully appreciate the new film. TLJ has eliminated that problem.
Why though? EVERYONE has seen Star Wars, and if they have not they are going to go see a new SW movie.
Yes, but is it enough to sustain the franchise going forward with a film released every year? In the old Lucas era it worked, but for the future? They have a proven business model with the MCU universe, filled with a wide variety of colorful characters. It makes perfect business sense to transfer that model to the Star Wars universe. That’s what they’re doing now in my view.