Honestly, the Sequel Trilogy is simultaneously to me a great series of films… and some of the most frustrating.
I very much enjoyed reading your post, thank you.
One thing I think gets overlooked is that the Sequel films did attempt to pay homage to the Original Trilogy, to try and respect it and its legacy. Whereas George wrote so many inconsistencies into the Prequels, contradicting the OT, it felt anything but that. It was as if George was trying to reinvent Star Wars and his “grand plan”, and was quite happy to diminish the OT at the expense of his Prequel Trilogy to try and achieve this.
When I think of some of the issues that the Sequels have, I try and give them a little more of “a pass” just for that. That respect, and that trying to make three films more in keeping with the Originals, in spirit at least. TFA and TLJ are easier to do this for, and TROS is more difficult, as that is one crazy break neck film with far too much happening too fast for anything to sink in. For me, anyway. As you posted, another year to help production for the film to iron out some of its issues would have helped considerably.
I never got to respond to this but I do appreciate your thoughts. I do feel people kind of overlook that regardless of what they thought of the ST? It had a monumentally tall order. I don’t think even George Lucas if he got to do his ST would’ve been able to predict how much of a pain it was gonna be. I mean forget inconsistencies, it’s George’s story and he could do what he wished and it really was up to us if we liked it or not but the ST was something that people had speculated about for years. Hell I remember when it came out that George at one point considered the idea of having four trilogies that would go from Episode I all the way to Episode XII. Obviously that changed but that meant the idea of Episode VII, VIII and IX has been kicking around since the OT’s prime and the issue is that at a certain point? Everyone developed their own idea of what Star Wars is and should be so no matter what, they were gonna piss people off to a degree. The same happened with the prequels after all, the EU and then TCW. Honestly it makes me feel jealous of the children who will grow up with these movies who can just watch them all in one go with none of the emotional baggage and look at them as their own things and appreciate them for that, just like how people who watched the prequels when they were children without seeing any of the other Star Wars movies were able to appreciate them.
I think the biggest takeaways though from the ST and what has happened are a few things. The first is that it’s a perfect example of what happens of when you stubbornly try to force an idea that just is not viable anymore, the second is that if you can manage then delay a movie to ensure you can work out all the beats possible, be willing to accept that a franchise may not be the thing you came to it for and that you have to come to terms with that (You don’t have to accept it but eventually one has to make their peace with it.) and the biggest of all? Fandom toxicity is a cancer. People should remember that if it wasn’t for toxic fans? George would still own the franchise and be happy about it with maybe the extent of him being done with Star Wars just coming from him growing tired of speaking about the same few topics with every interviewer.