I don’t agree with all of the choices made but I’m more than willing to argue in defense of what the film did well versus what it did not.
Good acting, cinematography, score, art design. The humor did not work in the slightest. But you know Mark and Carrie put their all into their performance. You get a good slice of the old Luke and Leia in there even if it’s not enough to satisfy original trilogy fans. And I like some of the film better than the novel, but the novel version is better in a lot of ways than the film in how it approaches the OT characters and treats them not as set pieces but people.
Han Solo’s funeral was moving beyond words to me. Why is that not in the film. Just so many odd decisions.
Lukes’s regret and Luke’s redemption are clear in the novel and not in the film. In the film you have to put yourself in his shoes and fill in the blanks, Rian gives you very little to understand other than the repetition of Kenobi’s hubris and pride as described in ROTJ novelization, being repeated. And a New Vader rising.
Watching the film with Rian’s commentary just confused me even more, I don’t see Star Wars the way he does or the character of Luke Skywalker and that is okay.
Maybe if duel of the fates had been made and Episode 9 stuck the landing people would be more forgiving of some of the more baffling choices made. I’m talking more of the sequel trilogy as a whole rather than the Last Jedi in isolation, the film does work better in isolation and not a direct sequel to Return of the Jedi.
Overall the sequels have better acting more understandable human interactions and motives and better dialog than the prequel trilogy. They are much better-looking films, the parts shot on film anyway and with real sets. You can fault them for not doing boring space politics, but I don’t disagree with why they did that, no one wanted midichlorians and space tariffs again. Rise of Skywalker has the worst story and dialogue period in the entire Saga enough for me to pull an Elrond say cast it into the fire destroy it.