For almost two decades now, Star Wars just has not been anywhere near where it was when it began in terms of quality. With the exception of Andor and the first two seasons of the Mandalorian, Star Wars has been mid at best, and at worst, downright insulting. 

Let us start with the movies. I stand with the assertion that the last genuinely enjoyable Star Wars movie was “Revenge of the Sith” in 2005, and even that had several dull moments and was only really saved by its excellent ending. The sequel trilogy had good ideas and very talented people behind it, however, it absolutely fumbled and ended on a dud with the “Rise of Skywalker.” It decreased in quality with each movie. 

The “Force Awakens” was the best of the sequels, but it was severely dragged down by the fact that all of the most interesting storylines were completely dropped by Rian Johnson in “The Last Jedi,” in his quest to have his very own “Empire Strikes Back.” 

Speaking of “The Last Jedi,” it had a myriad of problems itself. It was close to being a good movie, all it had to do was add a plot, add interesting characters, get a different director, change the story in its entirety, and be thrown in the garbage. In all seriousness, this movie was very bad, and was so full of filler that it was hard to tell  the difference between it and the actual substance of the movie (of which there was little). 

The entire casino storyline was entirely pointless and had no effect on the rest of the movie, other than padding the runtime. The way that the characters of Finn and Luke were so carelessly butchered brings a tear to my eye. They even killed off some of the very most interesting characters that were set up in the first movie like Snoke and Phasma. 

However, that movie looked like the “Mona Lisa” when compared to the next movie in the trilogy, “The Rise of Skywalker.” This movie is one of the worst instances of the blatant unoriginality and greed which plagues movies today. You can tell that they had no story to tell with this movie, so they just decided to bring back Palpatine for the hundredth time, and call it a day. They thought they could just bank off people’s nostalgia and bring back some original characters like Lando and people would line up to see it. Well, they were absolutely right, it made one billion dollars despite terrible reviews. This just goes to show the power of brand recognition to the point that they can make a terrible movie and people will see it. 

In terms of recent movies not in the sequel trilogy, “Rogue One” and “Solo” are fine.

The shows are a little better, with the first two seasons of “The Mandalorian” being fairly enjoyable, Andor being an actual masterpiece, and “The Clone Wars” which told very interesting stories. However there is still plenty of trash being produced, like the “Book of Boba Fett” who’s only two good episodes were the episodes without Boba Fett. The “Obi Wan Kenobi” show was also a let down, with one of the goofiest looking and most unnecessary chase scenes in cinema history. 

Despite all this, I still love Star Wars, and the original trilogy are still some of my all time favorite movies. I hope that Star Wars can pick up its game and I am hopeful for its future. So long as its creators have a story they want to tell and original ideas, such as they did with “Andor”, rather than just banking on nostalgia and brand recognition, Star Wars could quickly rise back to the level it once was during the original trilogy.