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Star Wars: The Last Jedi is a matter of days away with the first-look reviews dropping today at 5pm GMT.
The follow-up to JJ Abrams' 2015 sequel The Force Awakens reunites Daisy Ridley, Adam Driver, John Boyega and Oscar Isaac for a film that also sees the return of Luke Skywalker and General Leia Organa in what will be Carrie Fisher's final appearance following her death in December 2016.
Initial verdicts of the film - directed by Rian Johnson - flooded in on Twitter over the weekend with some deeming it the best Star Wars films since The Empire Strikes Back.
In any case, Disney and Lucasfilm seem to be happy with the outcome - it was revealed last month that Johnson will oversee a brand new trilogy of films after the release of Episode IX set in “...a corner of the galaxy that Star Wars lore has never explored.”
Below are the reviews of Star Wars: The Last Jedi.
Domhnall Gleeson, Laura Dern, Benicio del Toro and Kelly Marie Tran also star. The film is released in the UK on 14 December.
Star Wars: The Last Jedi trailer - shot-by-shot breakdown
Our critic Christopher Hooton writes: "If The Force Awakens was an homage and Rogue One was a bonus chapter, The Last Jedi is definitely a new proposition. Between getting about as philosophical as its possible to in a kids film about the nature of the Force and examining the notion of the hero and the crises of masculinity tied in to this, it wants to break the idea of Star Warsapart, inspect it and then put it back together in a different and more nuanced way. In this sense, it's easy to see why Disney has entrusted Johnson with developing an entire new trilogy."
Robbie Colin for The Telegraph writes in his five-star review: “The confrontations aren’t just thrilling and beautifully staged, but have an eeriness and loneliness that reminded me of Ralph McQuarrie’s unearthly Star Wars concept art from 1975.
“Lucas was able to use and develop much of what McQuarrie envisioned, but there was little space for those minor-key qualities amid the bustle of the first three films. The Last Jedi leans into them. It’s less Star Wars as you’ve never seen it than Star Wars as you’ve never felt it.”
Total Film conclude in their five-star review: "An excellent middle chapter bursting with wit, wisdom, emotion, shocks, old-fashioned derring-do, state-of-the-art tech, and stonking set-pieces."
The Guardian say in their four-star review: "The Last Jedi gives you an explosive sugar rush of spectacle. It’s a film that buzzes with belief in itself and its own mythic universe – a euphoric certainty that I think no other movie franchise has. And there is no provisional hesitation or energy dip of the sort that might have been expected between episodes seven and nine. What there is, admittedly, is an anticlimactic narrative muddle in the military story, but this is not much of a flaw considering the tidal wave of energy and emotion that crashes out of the screen in the final five minutes. It’s impossible not to be swept away."
Todd McCarthy for The Hollywood Reporter: "Maybe the film is a tad too long. Most of the new characters could use more heft, purpose and edge to their personalities, and they have a tendency to turn up hither and yon without much of a clue how they got there; drawing a geographical map of their movements would create an impenetrable network of lines. But there's a pervasive freshness and enthusiasm to Johnson's approach that keeps the film, and with it the franchise, alive, and that is no doubt what matters most."
Radio Times' write: "The end result is a bold, ballsy take on the Star Wars saga that is genuinely quite unlike anything I’ve seen before – but it’s bound to divide fans. Some people who’ve seen the film are enraged by the film’s treatment of certain characters and story arcs, and the routes director Rian Johnson has taken won’t appeal to everybody.
"This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, though. The Last Jedi will incense some but absolutely enthral others, and the end result will be passionate feeling on both sides that’s in stark contrast to the wider but shallower mass appeal of The Force Awakens (which I still really like, by the way – it’s just made to perform a different function to The Last Jedi)."
Another five-star review, this time from Digital Spy: At two and a half hours, the film is lengthy, but events move at such a pace that it doesn't drag or threaten to outstay its welcome. Johnson has created a movie that is both quintessentially Star Wars and richer than anything that has come before. Abrams has his work cut out if he wants to match this quality for Episode IX. It's either that or give up and drown in Ewoks.
Dissent from Variety, which claims that "Johnson’s effort is ultimately a disappointment."
"Ultimately, there’s only so much wiggle room Johnson has to play with a property that seems destined to generate a new installment/spinoff every year until we die — which means that however many Death Stars or Sith Lords the Resistance manages to defeat, there will always be more, and no matter how few Jedi remain, there can never be none."
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