BB-8 puppeteer Brian Herring has a message for sequel trilogy haters: calm down, you'll love these movies eventually. The Star Wars veteran argues the sequel trilogy is "no more polarizing" than the prequels and predicts that "in 10 years' time" they'll be beloved just like The Phantom Menace and company. It's the cinematic equivalent of "just wait, you'll understand when you're older."
And here's the thing: he's not entirely wrong. Nostalgia is a hell of a drug. Kids who grew up with the sequel trilogy will defend them with the same fervor that Millennials now bring to prequel apologism. The Rise of Skywalker will get its redemptive video essays. Kylo Ren will be celebrated as a misunderstood anti-hero. We've seen this movie before, both literally and metaphorically.
But Herring's comparison misses one crucial distinction: the prequels had a cohesive vision. George Lucas knew exactly where he was going from Phantom Menace to Revenge of the Sith. Messy execution? Absolutely. Dialogue that made Hayden Christensen look like he was reading cue cards? You bet. But there was a plan.
The sequel trilogy, by contrast, was three directors playing expensive improv. J.J. Abrams set up mystery boxes. Rian Johnson gleefully smashed them with a lightsaber. Abrams came back and frantically tried to retcon the retcons. The result wasn't a story arc - it was three good-to-great individual films that contradicted each other at fundamental levels.
That's not to say the sequels don't have merits. The Last Jedi is the most interesting Star Wars film since Empire, even if it breaks half the franchise's mythology. Adam Driver gave Kylo Ren more depth than the scripts deserved. The action sequences were consistently spectacular. But doesn't equal
