With the recent release of Star Wars The Rise Of Skywalker, we got to see the final chapter in the epic saga, so here’s our review look ahead for the DVD, Blu-ray and 4K Ultra HD release. It was always going to be a tough ask to live up to the weight of expectation, but the challenge was made all the more difficult by the lack of clear vision to cut through all three of the sequel trilogies.
JJ Abrams was at the helm for The Force Awakens before passing the baton fairly loosely to Rian Johnson, who went a little left-field. Abrams then picked things up again for Episode IX, and spent good amounts of time and story on retroactive continuity (retcon) changes, so there’s definitely a divergence in their concepts of The Force.
The story also feels rushed as it tries to do way too many things in a shorter period of time than The Last Jedi, which was a good twenty minutes longer. It’s easy to blame this on the retcon efforts, but the reality is that it was more to do with a general crush of events that could have been covered better by either stripping less important elements or just making the film longer.
At the beginning, it jumps around too quickly, like it’s in a rush to set things up, and then there are just too many seemingly important characters that don’t get enough time and space to unfurl properly. Either give them their proper due or leave them out. Don’t just throw some in for an easy ride into the next section of the story or to enable the shift in odds for the final battle.
However, ultimately the story does enough to close out the Skywalker Saga with good ties to the past, Force love and a whole lot of action. There’s emotional connection, stunning visuals and special effects and great settings and locations to act as the backdrop to the film.
In terms of the performances, both Daisy Ridley and Adam Driver are much better than they’ve been in either The Force Awakens and The Last Jedi. They both embody the conflict raging inside them pretty well and despite the evident gulf between the two they still do a good job of selling the whole star-crossed connection thing, which is no easy feat.
They’re helped massively by the sheer malevolence of Ian McDiarmid as Emperor Palpatine, is is on form throughout Rise. The idea of his return works well and the delivery mechanism and plot hook surrounding it is satisfying and helps to make the nine films more of a unit if his presence wasn’t felt in the sequel trilogy.
John Boyega and Oscar Isaac are decent enough too as Poe Damaran and Finn, but the real star of the show was Anthony Daniels, who puts in one of his best performances yet as C3PO. Billy Dee Williams is almost as Lando as he used to be, but Domhnall Gleeson, Richard E. Grant and even Mark Hamill are Far From their best.
New additions to the cast, Naomi Ackie as Jannah and Keri Russell as Zorii Bliss, don’t really get enough time to develop their character and relationships all that much, but you can’t fault their efforts on screen, brief though it might be. It’ll be interesting to see whether or not they return for more action in the Star Wars Universe in some. You can read more about our thoughts on what next after Star Wars The Rise Of Skywalker to get an idea of where we see them fitting in, or visit the official news page at https://www.starwars.com/news.
DVD, Blu-ray, 4K or rental?
The positives and negatives aside, the reality is that it is going to be in high demand when the DVD, Blu-ray and 4K versions of the film come out in April. The question for a lot of Star Wars fans will be less about whether to get it and more about which format to buy it on as a crucial end film to the saga.
To start with, if the visual impact of the film is even slightly important to you then don’t get the DVD, or the standard definition digital version either for that matter. Neither of them will come with anything significant in terms of special features and the lower definition will just detract from the re-watch value of The Rise Of Skywalker.
We’re still unconvinced by both HD and 4K digital image quality. It never seems as crisp as either Blu-ray or 4K Ultra HD disks, which are our picks of the bunch. They’ll both get all of the bonus content too, which makes them the best choice for such a big film.
Star Wars The Rise Of Skywalker special features
As the film has only just had its release in cinemas the details haven’t been confirmed for the special features, but we’re expecting them to be fairly big. As mentioned above, they should only be available on Blu-ray, 4K Ultra HD and digital HD/4K, which affects the review scores below.
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Review scores:
DVD – 3/5
Blu-ray- 4/5
4K disk – 4/5
Digital (standard definition) – 3/5
Digital (HD) – 3.5/5
Digital (4K) – 3.5/5
