10 Simple Fixes That Would Have Saved Star Wars: Rise Of Skywalker

5. Rey Builds Her New Lightsaber From The Start

Rey Rise of Skywalker
Lucasfilm

The Skywalker lightsaber is a big deal in the Sequel Trilogy. It's depicted in The Force Awakens as a powerful reminder of the Jedi's nobility, and of Luke Skywalker's heroics especially. At the same time, Kylo Ren desires the weapon as his birthright, a weapon that belongs to him that was once wielded by Darth Vader, his grandfather.

The Last Jedi also does something really interesting with the weapon. Kylo still covets it, but director Rian Johnson uses Anakin's saber as a narrative device to explore the limiting and occasionally toxic effects of nostalgia. Luke no longer has any reverence for the weapon, and uses it to taunt Kylo during their 'duel' on Crait. It's dead clever, and if the point was for our heroes to move past material possessions, then it was ultimately lost on Abrams' film, which saw Rey reforge the weapon... only to build her own in the *checks notes* last five seconds of the film.

We know Abrams is a sucker for retreading the Original Trilogy at this point, so why not give Rey her new, golden lightsaber at the beginning of the film? As it did in Episode VI, it would illustrate how our main protagonist has finally become their own Jedi - one not beholden to any one legacy.

Instead, Episode IX leaves this moment to the last second where Rey goes back to Tatooine, which has no significance to her or Leia, whilst also affirming herself as a new Skywalker. The act of constructing this new weapon feels completely pointless in that respect. Why not introduce it from the start?

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WhatCulture's very own resident movie guy, Ewan has been working in the content creation biz for over 10 years now, having started as a freelance contributor to WhatCulture Gaming all the way back in 2015. After graduating with a First-Class Honours in History from Northumbria University in 2017 (where he won a prize for a totally killer dissertation on the Watergate years), Ewan took on the role of Comics Editor at WhatCulture and quickly developed WhatCulture Comics into one of the biggest superhero-focused channels on YouTube. He followed this with a brief hiatus at Screen Rant in 2021, where he worked across the Gaming and Film sections as a writer and editor, before returning to WhatCulture as a Senior Content Producer / Presenter in 2023. He started his own podcast, We Love Dad Movies, in 2022, and has contributed several written pieces to the Eisner-nominated comics website Shelfdust as well. In his current role, Ewan incorporates his love of cinema, comic books, and history into written pieces and video essays for WhatCulture's Film & TV channel, as well as WhatCulture Gaming and WhatCulture Horror, with a particular focus on nineties-era Dad Movies, old school Westerns, and Golden Age Hollywood Noir. John Carpenter is his fave, and he thinks Batman Beyond should never have been cancelled. If that's your vibe, you'll probably like his stuff.