Star Wars: Rise Of Skywalker - Everything It Gets Wrong

7. Finn's Wasted Everything

Remember when Finn was the core of the new trilogy?

The centre of the posters and with a backstory centred around realising the First Order weren't the nicest of people, The Force Awakens folded his former slave-adjacent tale into going toe-to-toe with one of the leaders of his oppressors, Kylo Ren.

This was masterfully subverted when Rey took the lightsaber and defeated Kylo instead, but The Last Jedi then reframed Finn's goals as striking the ultimate blow against the First Order, by sacrificing himself to save the rebellion.

Obviously Rose undoes this and makes a valid point about dying for the sake of dying, but this was apparently something JJ Abrams just couldn't further iterate on. Even the kiss with Rose is forgotten about, and Finn's only motivation script-wise is thirsting for Rey, which also goes nowhere.

As if teasing a version of the script where something could've happened, in Rise of Skywalker, Finn meets up with new character Jannah, and discovers an entire group of former stormtroopers who abandoned their posts due to "a feeling".

That's it though. No partnering up with Jannah, no scene of them embracing at the end. Nothing other than a fun enough battle scene and a hug between him, Rey and Poe at the climax.

What a waste of time.