Like every Star Wars movie released since I’ve been alive (Episode 1 was the first one) I went to see the opening premier of Star War: Rise of Skywalker.

Be ready for a barrage of Star Wars posts in the next few days. Which I’m assuming is better than no posts like the last few weeks.

My review is here, but I wanted to get something out there about it. While I enjoyed the movie immensely, I was still left wondering about a few things. These are my top 7 questions about Star Wars Rise of Skywalker.

How did the Emperor come back?

The Emperor is back. I’m not sure that we would have known it, but it is literally beat over our head that he is back and looking to take over again.

What is never mentioned in this movie though, is how he came back. Last we saw him (in chronological order, not movie order) he was thrown down a shaft, electrocuted by his own lightening, and then we are left to assume that he blew up with the Death Star II.

Now, we are told that he has broadcast a message to the world that he is back.

Ummmmm, a couple of issues here for this guy. Maybe it’s the creative writing teacher in me, or perhaps the writer in me, or maybe the Star Wars fan in me, but wouldn’t it have been better to show the signal instead of just telling us that he’s back and having Kylo Ren find him in the first like 2 minutes of the movie? Then we are told that he created Supreme Leader Snoke and Kylo Ren.

As it is, we get no information on how he survived. There’s no info about how he escaped the Death Star. We see some bodies in a tube, so maybe we are supposed to assume that the Emperor really did make Snoke. Maybe those were Emperor clones and that’s all that this Emperor is.

When did the Emperor have kids?

Along the lines of how did he come back, when exactly did the Emperor have kids? We have never seen anything about Palpatine’s family in the prequels or the sequels. Now, we have to assume that he had a family while terrorizing the Galaxy? Seems like a stretch.

What we do know that his kids don’t seem to want to be around him. Did whoever had Palpatine’s kid want that kid?

As much as I didn’t like Star Wars: The Last Jedi, I felt like Rian Johnson’s reveal that Rey’s parents were nobodies was a better reveal. It made Rey a stronger character on her own. This just feels cheap. It is an easy way to bring back a bad guy that in my opinion didn’t need to be brought back at all.

Who were all those people at the Sith base?

While I’m harping on the resurrection and family creating of the Emperor, I have a quick question… Who were all the people in the audience during the final encounter with Rey?

The audience is packed with… Sith? I thought that there could only be two at a time. Was it all the Sith from history Come back? If it was, where was Sidious, Vader, or Maul?

Regardless, this isn’t really a story point. It looked cool during the finale, but left me wondering.

Why wasn’t Leia’s training mentioned earlier?

As we pick up with Rey, we see that Rey is now being trained to be a Jedi by Leia.

Now, correct me if I’m wrong, but has it ever been mentioned that Luke trained Leia in the Jedi ways? I can’t recall a time it was said. It seems like a huge plot point left out for years.

If she received training, and Luke was missing in The Force Awakens, why didn’t Leia just train Rey then? Why make her find Luke to be her teacher?

If she was trained, at least a little, I feel like Leia could have done so much more than just space walk. According to the Luke, Leia stopped her training before it was complete but it looked like she was pretty far along in the flashback. She was far enough along to build a lightsaber which is usually a last step in the expanded universe.

Luke says that she stopped her training because she knew that her son would turn to the dark side…

If Leia knew her son would turn, why did Luke try to kill him?

Um, what? Why would Leia stop her training because she knew that her son would turn evil? That doesn’t even make sense.

That’s like saying I’m going to stop going to school because I know my future child will end up getting in trouble.

Leia, and Luke until he was changed in The Last Jedi, seemed to always believe in pushing yourself and being yourself. At what point would seeing that someone would turn out bad make you stop training yourself? I feel like completing your Jedi training would probably make things better!

Where did the Knights of Ren come from?

As Kylo Ren terrorizes the universe, it seems that he has grown his Knights of Ren club.

Where did these Knights come from? Are they dark side Force users? We never see them use the force, so I would assume that they aren’t able to use the Force.

It feels like Abrams needed something more than Stormtroopers to chase Rey, so he brought these guys in. Or maybe he wanted to make good on The Knights of Ren he created back in the first movie. There just isn’t much screen time devoted to the rise of this “army” nor is there explanation on them at all.

Why did the Emperor want Kylo Ren to kill Rey if he wanted her to inherit his power?

Okay, I can get past there being a revived Emperor, but what I can’t get past is the 360 degree turn the character makes.

Throughout the new trilogy, Snoke and Palpatine want Kylo Ren to kill Rey. I’ve only seen this movie once, and I didn’t take notes, but I’m pretty sure that the Emperor wanted Ren to kill his granddaughter for most of the movie. I remember that if Kylo Ren killed Rey, the Emperor would give Ren the Final Order ships.

So Kylo Ren peruses Rey, the scavenger, throughout the galaxy. He never kills her, but Instead tells her the truth: Rey is the granddaughter of Emperor Palpatine. This sends Rey on a quest to find her grandpa – and kill him.

Then once she finds him, Palpatine wants Rey to strike him down so that he can basically take over her body. Was that the plan he had from the start, because it sure didn’t feel like it.

But why did the Emperor want Ren to kill Rey if he wanted her body (that sounds dirty)? I don’t get the turn. Is it like If you can’t beat them, join them?

Since no one could kill Rey, she must be the best. Did he know that Ren wouldn’t be able to kill her? If that’s the case, he must have known the Ren would return to being a Solo. It just makes no sense!

Wrap up of my Rise of Skywalker Questions

I know I ask some critical questions here, but I really did enjoy the movie. I wouldn’t put it at the top of the list or anything, but it was enjoyable.

Still, Star Wars Rise of Skywalker raised some questions that didn’t get answered.

What did you think of Star Wars: Rise of Skywalker- the newest Star Wars movie? Let me know in the comments!